


The GYM

by Signel_chan



Category: Homestuck
Genre: F/M, Family, Gyms, Humanstuck, Memory Loss, Weight Issues
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-02-11
Updated: 2014-06-29
Packaged: 2018-01-12 00:59:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 35,373
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1180023
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Signel_chan/pseuds/Signel_chan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>While the gym is the one thing that Equius does remember about his life, there is much more to it that he's forgotten...even though he's slowly getting all the lost memories back. The hardest thing for him to remember is the woman by his side.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Recovery Of Forgotten Memories

**Author's Note:**

> Hi there! You may have read this before on Tumblr, because I posted it there like a year and a half ago. It took me until now to find a fitting title for it and the stories that follow it. In case you were wondering, in the title, GYM stands for "Growth of Your Memories" and refers to Equius and how he only really remembers, in the beginning of the stories, what happens at the gym, and how the gym is pretty much the springboard for all the growth and memories that happen in his life.  
> The summary, characters, and additional tags will update as the story does, and I'll post the following stories eventually!

The phone ringing to wake her up was something that she was rather used to by now; it had been happening every single morning for the past many weeks, and she wasn't sure when it was going to stop. But she had to answer it, because if she didn't, the dynamics of everything, but especially of the relationship she was trying so hard to rebuild, would be ruined. “Hello, you've reached Aradia's bedroom,” she said upon picking the phone up off the receiver, “and you're calling me about five minutes later than normal. Why the change?”

“It took five minutes longer to remember you, I guess,” the voice on the other end replied. Even though it still held its husky and deep qualities, it wasn't the same voice she was accustomed to hearing from this person. “But I think I have my memories straight enough to see you.”

“Are you sure? We don't have to do anything today, if you don't want...” The breathing on the other end of the line was heavy, and just the sound of it was making her smile, even if no words were coming from him. “I guess, if you really want to, we can go do things. I was thinking maybe we'd go to the park and to lunch today.”

The man on the other side of the phone sighed, a long and content sound that made Aradia smile even more. “That sounds lovely. Do you want to come get me, or should I go get you?”

“It's my turn to get you, so I'll just get dressed and then I'll be over there!” Without so much as a goodbye she slammed the phone down on the receiver and jumped out of bed, ready to face the world. Her long red hair was wavy and unruly, and when she was combing it after getting dressed, she noticed that her natural brown roots were starting to show and that she needed to redden those again soon. Overall, though, she was happy with her appearance, and she even winked at her reflection, before dashing out of the room and down the stairs, to the main floor. “Okay, I'm here!” she announced, before barging into the guest bedroom.

The sight that she was greeted with made her open her eyes and whistle. The man that had called her to wake her up was in the middle of getting himself dressed, and he was completely undressed, and she had the best possible view of him. “Oh, you're here already,” he said, as he began to clothe himself. “I would have expected you to take longer. I apologize for this. It's obscene and I am sure you would have much rather not seen it.”

“No, it's quite all right! I'm used to seeing that, actually.” The moment those words left her mouth, she was silently cursing at herself. She wasn't supposed to say things like that around him. “I mean, I dream about you sometimes. You're much more, uh, well-endowed in real life than you are in my dreams.” Untrue, as she knew his exact measurements and held her dreams to the standard that they got them exactly correct. “But it's really okay. A peek or two isn't bad.”

Saying all of that stung, but she knew it was for the best. “Oh, well, if you're certain that seeing me in the nude is okay, then you are more than welcome to come spend the night with me sometime, miss Aradia.” He was wearing only pants at this point, but she was still able to admire his chiseled chest, which she was madly in love with. “Unless that's against the rules. Is it?”

“It took you five minutes to remember who I am this morning. You're still convinced that I live somewhere else, when I'm seriously right upstairs. I think me sleeping here with you would just shock you in the morning when you woke up.” This was something she explained every morning, it seemed, because he could never remember her saying it. “I wish I could come stay with you, though, or, rather, you come stay with me.”

“Why would I come stay with you?” he asked, putting his shirt on and giving a sigh of relief that he was finally dressed. “It is impolite and I would feel much more comfortable if you stayed here.”

She approached him, touching one of his muscular arms. “Because, Equius, you're supposed to be with me. Your mind is telling you I don't exist to you, that you're just a single guy, but you're not. I'm in your life.”

“I would remember you if that's the case. But I don't. You're just the lady that takes me places and tells me stories that you dream up.” He looked down at her and smiled, his dark eyes shining with childish happiness—and she could feel her heart breaking. “You mentioned the park and lunch for today. Is there a special occasion?”

As much that she wanted to tell him that yes, yes there was a special occasion, that it was their third wedding anniversary, but she couldn't. She couldn't tell him that, especially since he didn't know her as anything but an assistant. “I'm just feeling like that's what we should do today. The weather's supposed to be really nice, and I'd like to sit in the park and tell you another one of my fantasies, and take you to lunch after at one of my favorite places.”

“Sounds fantastic.” With that, he lifted her up and tossed her over one shoulder, carrying her out of the room like she was a heavy sack of something. “We shall be going now, right?”

“Grab my purse and shoes on the way out, and then we can go, yeah!” If he had the ability to remember her, he would be reminded that she hated being carried like this, like a misbehaving child, but he didn't know, and she wasn't going to scold him for it. “And make sure you wear shoes yourself! Bare feet aren't allowed anywhere!”

“As you say, miss Aradia.” Equius did as she said, being very careful to grab the only purse and women's shoes that were near the door (done purposefully by Aradia, because she knew if he had a choice, he would freeze up and not know what to do), and slipped his own shoes on, before opening the front door wide and walking out into the sunshine with the woman on his shoulder. In his opinion, it was definitely going to be a good day, but in hers, it was going to be yet another painful reminder of what she had lost.

* * *

They were sitting on one of the benches at the park, just watching the happy couples who were holding hands and whispering sweet things to each other, or waving politely at the occasional one of their friends that would come by. For the most part, Aradia's eyes were focused in one direction and Equius' in the other, both of them only meeting gazes whenever someone they knew or recognized went past. For close to an hour they sat there without speaking a single word to the other, and, in Aradia's honest opinion, she would much rather it be that way.

“May I ask you something?” Equius asked, turning his head to look at her. “You might be able to help me here.”

Her head snapped to see him, with a confused expression and that happiness shining in his eyes, and she wondered what, exactly, he could want. “Yeah, go ahead. What's your question?”

“There's this brown-haired woman running through my mind. I have no idea who she is, but she looks familiar and I think I'm supposed to know her.” Aradia gasped, putting a hand to her mouth. “What, do you know who she is?”

“I don't know, but you having a woman in your mind must mean something. I hope you find your 'dream' girl sometime.” How it bothered her to have to hide the fact that she did know who he was thinking about, and how she was sharing a bench with him right then! But if she said that she was the woman in his thoughts, all the progress they had ever made would be ruined, because he wouldn't trust her any longer. It was bad enough that he would forget her every morning, but if he was beginning to remember her...maybe there was something good going on. “Can you tell me more about this woman?”

He nodded, before tilting his head back to face the sky. “She's absolutely beautiful. She's got long brown hair that curves and waves and looks fantastic. It's kind of like yours, but brown instead of red. And she's small. Tiny, even. Kind of like you are. But she's really nice and she tells me stories about adventures and she swears she's written all the stories she tells, but they sound too good to be true.”

“She sounds like a really amazing woman,” she said after a few moments of admiring how his deepest memories portrayed her. “Is there anything else about her that I should know, just so I can help you find her?”

“Not that I remember, no.” That was where their conversation ended, with him sighing and watching the clouds, and her wondering just how long it would be until he realized that he was describing his dream woman to the woman he was actually dreaming about. Once again the time went by, with the two of them in silence, but after maybe ten minutes, Equius broke it again. “May I ask another question, or was the one I asked earlier enough?”

“Ask as many questions as you want, okay?” Aradia smiled at him. “I'm trying to help you piece your life back together, and I guess that means a lot of questions that need to be answered.”

This time, he came closer to her and wrapped his arm around her. “Do you have a twin? Is she this lady I'm thinking about. You're just like her, but...she's so youthful and you, you're not.” With the hand that wasn't holding onto her, he traced a few of the wrinkles that were on her face, signs of all the stress he had been putting her through. “And she's telling me that she's my wife, but I'm not married, am I?”

Aradia's heart started pounding at just the thought of answering that truthfully. Sure, it would make her feel better to have told him that yes, yes he is, and to her, but she knew that doing that was not the best plan of action. “I don't think you are. What's she telling you?”

“She's saying that we're married, and have been for three years...” This manifestation of herself in his memory was really smart, she noted, but she didn't say anything. “And that she misses me terribly and wants me to be me again. But I am me. I'm just really confused about why this lady I have never seen before is telling me this, when I know it's not true.”

“One time I dreamed that I was married,” she lied, trying to comfort him in his confusion. “It was pretty cool. The guy looked a lot like you, but he was much scarier and was addicted to going to the gym and stuff. It was a good dream, but it ended when the guy disappeared, and I couldn't ind him anywhere.”

“That sounds like a bad dream.” He pulled her a bit closer to her, and twirled a strand of her hair around one of his fingers. “It sounds like a nightmare, actually. How could losing the guy of your dreams be a good thing?”

There she was, about to say something that would probably confuse him more, but, for once, it wouldn't be something that would give away the fact that they were together. “I know I'll find him again someday, just like you'll meet your dream woman. I'm keeping faith that we'll be brought back together, but each day that goes by, that faith fades a bit more, because the memories I have of him seem to be tainted more and more.”

“I hope you find him, then. He seems like he's a good guy for you, even if he isn't real.” And right then, the tears started falling for a reason that she couldn't explain. She wasn't about to tell him that he was very much real, that he was playing with her hair right then. She was just going to cry and ask, rather politely, if it would be okay to skip lunch, because all she wanted to do was sit at home and cry. He understood that something, whatever it was, wasn't okay, and took her back to the house, where she locked herself in her bedroom and looked at the memory books she had made for the past several years, just revisiting all the good times they had.

He, meanwhile, looked at the pictures on the walls, asking himself why she was withholding information about her “twin” that he was posing with in all of them.

* * *

They went to lunch the next day, after a night of many tears from Aradia, and many unanswered questions from Equius. She picked a local place to dine at, somewhere that they had gone many times together before he lost his memories of her, just to see if it triggered anything. That plan proved unsuccessful, but she did get asked many a time why she was wearing makeup, and if it was to cover the wrinkles that seemed to always be there.

Truthfully, she was wearing it to hide the bruises and puffiness from all her crying and eye-rubbing, but she played along with his questions. “Yes, I'm hiding my age. I mean, an old woman like me shouldn't be going out in public flaunting her flaws, because she needs to keep up the appearance that she's young and beautiful.”

“Your twin doesn't look nearly as old as you. I saw pictures of her in your house yesterday, and I was wondering why you didn't tell me that she's real. Are you doing it to protect me?” Yes, actually, she was, but it wasn't Aradia's intention to tell him that, so she shook her head and simply said that she didn't believe it was her twin, because her twin was unmarried. “Well, I think it's her that's running through my mind, and I want her to stop. She's telling me about the day we met.”

“About the day you met, huh?” She had to be careful not to repeat that as “the day we met.” because, even though it was true in every sense, he didn't know that. “Can you tell me about it, because I'm really curious about it.”

He nodded, putting his elbows down on their table and leaning forward to give her a serious look. “I remember the place exactly. The lobby at the gym. She came out of the changing room when I did, and it was her first day there. She was beautiful in her workout gear, and she asked me if I could help her, because she didn't have a partner and she needed one.” As he spoke, he kept blinking, and Aradia was more focused on the blinks than the story. “Are you listening?”

“Hm? Oh, yes I am.” How lying hurt her, but she didn't want him to stop. She was thinking that maybe, by having Equius tell the story of how they met, he would realize that he was telling it to its other half. “Please continue. I want to know more about this gym goddess of yours.”

“I myself was training alone, as my normal partner--” he froze, trying to remember a name that had escaped him, “--well, she wasn't there. So I took this new lady around and assisted her in all of her routines, and in exchange, she gave me assistance and her phone number. I bet if I thought hard enough, I could still recite it.”

Aradia scrunched her nose in disgust at the idea. “No thanks, Equius. I'd rather not worry you with that task. Is there anything else about her that you can tell me?”

“She has to be your twin. That's it. Her name starts with an A, like yours, and she looks just like you, but...she's not. You aren't her. I would definitely remember you if I was married to you.” Him saying that made her bite down hard on her tongue, because he was denying the truth, even if he honestly didn't know it, and the fact that he couldn't recognize her face as the one in his memories was beginning to tear her heart apart little by little. “Is something wrong, Aradia? Did I upset you with my story?”

He did, but she shook her head and loosened the grip her teeth had on her tongue. “Nothing's wrong. I'm just so upset that you can't find her, and that I'm not able to do much to help remedy this problem!” How wrong she knew she was, because she was doing everything she could to get him to remember her. “Say, Equius, do you remember anything about this place? I know my twin liked to eat here.”

“I think so,” he replied, leaning forward even more and dropping his voice down to a husky whisper. “Unless I'm completely mistaken, this is where I took her to dine before we went to the park for a...carriage ride, I do believe. Horse-drawn carriage, yes. That's where I asked her to marry me. She loved the ride, I loved the horse.”

“I went on a carriage ride once, in my dreams. That was where my dream man proposed to me, actually. He did it because he knew how much I loved those rides, and he always wanted to make me happy. Like you, he was also interested in the horse. It was a white one, I do believe...” Aradia let her voice trail off, catching Equius' raised eyebrow in her direction. “What, are you going to say that you had a white horse pulling your carriage?”

“Yes, actually, I am. It was a beautiful steed, with a finely groomed mane and coat. I was rather pleased that they took such great care of it.” He laughed and smiled, not noticing even a little bit that Aradia's face held an expression of shock, from him being able to remember such details as the horse's color but not remember her.

She sat there in this shocked state for most of the meal, not speaking when he addressed her, because of the fear that if she tried to talk, she'd blurt out things she'd been keeping inside of herself for the past two months, since she had first seen him look at her with dazed eyes and ask who, exactly, she was. At first it had been cute, having to constantly remind him who she was, that she was Aradia, the woman that had devoted her life to him, but as he grew more stubborn in rejecting the idea that she was anything more than a friend, she grew silent on the topic. And when faced with a situation as such, she chose to keep her mouth firmly closed rather than accidentally say something that would confuse him.

Sometimes, it hurt more to be silent than to lie to his face.

* * *

“Why are you treating me to ice cream, Aradia? I thought that you said you didn't want to take me anywhere today.” Equius, like usual, was confused about the situation he was in, and he was voicing his problems. “I was ready for a day to sit back and think more about what's been going on in my head...”

Since he was sitting down in the chair already, she handed him his paper bowl and grinned, before taking the seat right next to him. “Well, it's only polite to buy something when you're going to be sitting somewhere. A friend of mine is going to meet us here, and I figured that, while we wait for her, we could be eating ice cream.” That proved to be a good idea, for just as they were finishing up, a couple bringing with them two young girls sat in the other chairs at their table. “Equius, do you recognize these people?”

“Yes, in fact, I do,” he said, after looking between them for a few moments. “That man there is Dave and the woman is Terezi, correct?”

“Still doesn't have his memory, huh?” the woman, Terezi, asked with a bit of a cackle-like laugh. “This is going to be interesting.”

“If by interesting you mean 'a very challenging time for me,' then yes, you're right.” Aradia shook her head and nudged Equius, who was staring rather intently at the older of the girls, in the arm. “Hey, stop that. Boots there doesn't need you giving her dirty looks.”

His head turned and she noticed that he was now shooting her a cross-eyes look. “I wouldn't consider this dirty.” His eyes went back to a natural position and he looked back at the little girl, who clapped and reached for him. “Her name is Boots? That is such a strange name for such a beautiful child.”

“Strange? Do you not know what the show 'Dora the Explorer' is? Because, aside from teaching you basic Spanish to yell at the idiots working basically anywhere, it's got morals.” Dave, bouncing the other child on the table, gave Equius a rather stern look. “And Terezi said that show made her laugh no matter what, so Boots and Dora it ended up being.”

“That is just ridiculous, though. If you're half as wise as I remember you being, you would not pander to something as strange as that!” The muscular man got up from his chair then, and his physically intimidating stature had both of the little girls hiding their eyes and Aradia jumping to stop him from doing something stupid. “However, you're obviously not the man I remember you being, so maybe I'm giving you credit you don't deserve.” It was then that he walked off, causing Aradia to scream at him to come back, but he ignored her orders as he crossed the street and entered the parking lot for the gym.

Under her breath, Aradia muttered, “Fucking great. He's gone. Now I have to actually go in there and deal with all the people and I'd rather not...” Meanwhile, Dave was passing the child that he held off to Terezi, so he could get up and partake in the chase.

“If I don't come back in twenty minutes, I want you guys to come over and get us,” he said before leaving the two women and the two children at the table. They tried to re-establish some normalcy, but with the older child asking where her dad went, and the younger one crying, Aradia covered her ears and put her head down on the table, just wishing that everything and everyone would just disappear. 

Things like that didn't happen in reality, though. “Funny how it's the two of them over there and the four of us here,” Terezi said once both of the children calmed down. “The last time we were like this was the night of the accident...”

“Yeah, believe me, I know.” And with that, all that came into Aradia's mind was the details of that night: of the wonderful conversation her and Terezi had been holding before the first wail of a siren filled their ears, of the panic that set in when she saw the fire truck pull into that parking lot, and the even more intense worry that brought her nearly to her knees when she saw the ambulance that pulled in. In vivid color she could remember the headlights of the cars they crossed in front of to get to the gym, to see what was wrong, and she could remember when they found Dave and all hugged him, happy to know that it wasn't him that was in need. But then she remembered the absolute horror that filled her when she saw her Equius on the floor, all the people surrounding him. She remembered that dazed look in his eyes, his inability to remember anything about her. “I know all too well.”

“Do you think we should maybe go over there too? I mean, would it make things easier?”

Although she would have rather never set foot in that gym again, she agreed to the idea and within moments they were entering through the big glass front doors of the gym, where all the sweaty men in muscle shirts and women who were there for the classes offered stared at them. “I don't see either of them, Terezi. In fact, I don't see anyone I know...” No sooner had Aradia said that than a familiar face entered her line of vision. “Actually, yes I do.” Making sure that Terezi and the children were sitting down on a bench near the entrance, she made her way over to where the tall blonde woman was standing. “Excuse me, um, Vriska?”

The blonde looked at Aradia and grinned, waving a hand that was wrapped in bandages. “Hey there, Aradia! How's everything going with you and Equius? I saw him just a few minutes ago, and he seemed to remember me just fine, but then when I asked about you, he was wondering why I was asking about a friend at that time.”

“He still doesn't remember me at all. I'm nothing to him, really, but he does remember that he's married, and he remembers everything about me, except me myself. It's really weird.” She shook her head and sighed, before gesturing at the bandages. “What happened there?”

“Broke my hand about a week after he got hit in the head with one of the weights. I was planning on coming back after it healed and retaking my position here, but plans changed and I'm quitting, I guess.” Her voice sounded dejected, and Aradia assumed that these particular plans that had changed weren't exactly pleasant. “I'll come back here someday, but not anytime soon. Not until my hand is good and strong again, among other things.”

When Aradia went to say something to Vriska, she was interrupted by a male voice coming from behind her: “It was really good to see you again, okay? I'm glad that you were still here today.” It was Equius and she knew it. On her toes she spun to face him, and him and Dave both stood there, looking like the majestic men they were. “Oh, you're here too, Aradia. How nice. Can we just go home now? My head kind of hurts...”

Without so much as a goodbye to anyone around, she grabbed his hand and took him away, because there were some things she was okay with, and what had just happened was not one of them. It was very clear to her that she needed to do something to remedy this issue, and, catching a glimpse of herself in one of the glass doors upon exit, she knew exactly what that something was going to have to be.

* * *

In addition to being a really good friend of theirs, Dave was also useful in getting people help that they deserved. In this case, Aradia needed someone to help her strip her hair of the red color and she needed someone to talk to who didn't know the situation. She told Dave this and he told her to go to his sister, who was pretty good with hair and even better at analyzing people's problems, which sounded pretty amazing to her.

Leaving Equius to himself at home was the one problem—she didn't want to bring him along, but she didn't want to burden anyone else with him. He swore that he would be fine, and after making him promise that under any circumstances he wouldn't enter her bedroom (she made sure to say “her” and not “our” when she spoke to him), she believed him and went to pay a visit to Dave's sister.

This sister, this blonde woman with an all-knowing glint in her eyes and a serene smile on her lips, introduced herself as Rose, and knew before Aradia even opened her mouth who she was and why she was there. “I'm not charging a thing for this, because Dave said you needed it, but I'm curious. Why come to me for these things, instead of going to someone professional? Wouldn't it make more sense to do that?”

“More sense, sure, but professionals pry and I don't want prying. I just want to talk and be heard and have friendly conversation.” Aradia lifted a bag that she had brought along, that was filled of several containers of color stripper. “Oh, and I couldn't find anywhere that would do this for me for cheap.”

“You came to the right place then.” Rose took the bag from Aradia's hand and looked inside of it. “Why don't you like the red color? I think it looks really nice on you. Makes your skin stand out more, not to mention your eyes. You look fantastic with the red.”

“I think so too, actually, but...”

Rose guided Aradia to a place where she could sit while work began. “But what? Did something happen that caused you to dye it, and now you want it natural again?”

“Not quite.” Mentally thanking Dave for not telling Rose anything more about the situation than necessary, she prepared to break into the story. “I've been dyeing it for probably a year now, but two months ago, there was an accident and someone very dear to me lost all their memories of me...but lately he's been remembering me as I was before I dyed my hair red. I think if I can go back to my natural brown, he'll see me as who I really am and he'll remember me.”

“It's worth a shot, honestly. There's no harm in trying, because if he can remember you as brunette, then it might just be the hair that's throwing him off.” Rose began to mess with Aradia's hair, but still spoke. “By any chance, is he the one that had the gym accident? The one with the weight being dropped on him? Or is that a different one of Dave's friends?”

The mental thanking ended, and Aradia took a deep breath before explaining. “Yes, that's him. From what I've gathered from people, he was trying something new, and the person who was helping him had a lapse of judgment, and before they could do anything, the weight he was messing with dropped on him and he hit the ground. That's where I found him, out of his mind, laying on the floor, and he looked at me and couldn't remember who I was at all. Since then, I've been trying to remind him about me, but it's not working.”

“I'm sorry if this sounds like I'm intruding on things, but what have you tried?”

“I've taken him everywhere around here that holds memories for us. Our favorite restaurants. The park with the carriage rides. Fuck, I've even taken him back to that gym! But nothing works! He's gained back memories, but he doesn't remember me. I haven't shared a bed with him in two months, and it's killing me to wake up every morning and be alone!” She grumbled a little, before continuing. “I'm not going to give up on him, though. I love him too damn much to let something this stupid destroy what we had!”

Rose clicked her tongue in thought. “This is going to sound strange, since we don't know each other and it is virtually one stranger telling another to do something reckless, but maybe you should do a little something for him tonight? Don't let him see you until he's in bed, and then come in with your hair back to normal and the intent to ride him.”

“That is the strangest thing I have ever been told to do, but I like the idea. It would be pretty fun, honestly, just to see if he would even remember me in the morning...”

Some hours and many stories later, and Rose was washing the mixture out of Aradia's hair, before drying it and showing her her new reflection. There were very slight remnants of the red, but, for the most part, it was almost back to normal. “I really hope this does it for you. I hope you can call me sometime in the very near future and tell me he's remembering you again. Your story is really touching, and I'd be honored if I knew I had helped give it a happy ending.”

“I'll let you know what happens, for sure!” She fingered bits of her hair, smiling at how great it looked. “I'm just excited to see if this is what does it for me or not! He better appreciate my new hair, and he better be able to look me in the eyes and remember that this is me!”

“What will you do if it doesn't work?” Rose moved the mirror so Aradia couldn't see herself in it anymore. “Will you try something else?”

“Of course! I'm not going to lose him, and if it means I spend every day for the rest of my life trying to get him to realize that the woman of his dreams is the one taking care of him, then so be it!”

* * *

Her words that she had said to Rose never left her head. So be it? Of course so be it. She was in love with Equius more than she was in love with anything else, and she was not going to lose him without a serious fight. And, like Rose had suggested, she stayed out until after dark, coming back at the time she knew he would be laying in bed, reading or something. She had one shot to do this, and she was not going to mess it up.

Tripping up the stairs was not part of the plan, but when he didn't jump up to see if she was okay, she knew that he must have been in the middle of a particularly thrilling novel or something. When she entered her bedroom, she caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror, and she looked very much like the her in the pictures all over the house. The darkness of her hair even seemed to detract from the wrinkles a bit, which made her happy. Maybe this would be what triggered his memory. As she stared at her reflection, Rose's voice echoed in her mind, specifically the part about having the intent to ride Equius. And boy, did she have the intent.

Her reflection changed as she got the courage to slowly undress, sighing the entire time but knowing that she was doing this for both of them. Things soon went downhill, because the very second that she unhooked her bra and declared herself completely nude she heard footsteps coming up the stairs, and her door, at the very top of the staircase, was wide open and she was standing in front of it. Standing completely still in horror, she watched out of the corner of her eye as Equius came into view, holding his book over his face as he read. 

“Excuse me, Aradia, but I have a question. Tomorrow, do you think we can...” His question was cut short as he moved the book and saw her standing there. “Oh. Hello there. I didn't mean to intrude on you, but you're, uh, much more well-endowed in real life than you are in my dreams.” The grin that came onto his face after saying that was half playful, half seductive. “I don't remember who it was who said that to me, but I feel stealing their words to tell you that is worth it.”

She felt her cheeks warming up into a blush as he pulled his pants off. “Okay, since I think you're about to take me right here, can I ask you a question? Who am I to you?”

“Who are you? What kind of absurd question is that? You're Aradia, my very beautiful wife! Why would you even ask me that?” He didn't seem to realize even a tiny bit that he had completely forgotten that fact even as recent as that morning. “But it doesn't matter right now. You can explain later. Right now, I want you in that bed and I want to be in it with you.”

Never before did those words sound so sweet to Aradia's ears. At least for the moment, her nightmare was over.


	2. The Growth of Their Family

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Equius still has lingering memory problems which flare up every once in a while. That wouldn't be so bad if it weren't for the fact that he doesn't remember Aradia when he's in the middle of an amnesia episode, and remembering her is a pretty vital thing...especially since she's expecting their first child.

The face poking and whispering in her ear was something that she was still trying to get adjusted to; it happened about once a month, and every time it did happen, it would startle her into consciousness. First of all, those were strong fingers poking her face, ones that were used to the rigors of weightlifting, and secondly, they were just poking her cheeks, while other fingers that would potentially be near her in her sleep would be hitting everything and occasionally pulling her long brown hair. “What do you want?” she calmly asked every time it was the muscular fingers, and this time it was no exception.

“Yes, hello, I was wondering, why are you in my bed?” The voice was the same as it always was when this happened, deep and rough, but there was a sense of confusion in it that was there to alert her to there being a problem. “Are you supposed to be there? Is this a dream? Can you please tell me who you are and what you want with me?”

The next time he poked her cheek, she grabbed his wrist and held it. “Okay, listen here. You're gonna remember me tomorrow, but today is one of your off days. My name is Aradia. I am your wife. Have been for a while. Almost four years.” He opened his mouth to protest, but she silenced him quickly. “I know, you don't remember me. And that's a problem. See my hair?” She sat up and, with the hand not holding him, unraveled her long braid. “This used to be red. You got hit in the head with a weight at the gym and couldn't remember me until I let it be natural again.”

“So you're saying I not only met you, but dated and married you, and I can't remember it?”

“Exactly what I'm saying. You catch on quickly. Now don't worry, I'm not going to say you have a big job or something to go to, because you don't. The minute I get up, I'll be making a call telling your boss that you're having one of your bad days, and that you going in will be pointless.” She pulled his hand closer to her, while taking the blankets off of her body with her other hand. “Oh, also, one more thing I've got to tell you, which you won't need to hear tomorrow because you'll remember.” Placing his hand on her barely-there stomach bump, she grinned at him. “Be careful with me, will you?”

Instead of acting enthused, like he would have on a normal morning, he just blinked at her, truly unsure of what to do. “Are you implying something with this? You're a little fat. So what?”

“Are you fucking kidding me? Equius, I know I'm supposed to love you and be with you through all of your ups and downs, but did you really just say that to me? That's just rude.” She shook her head, clicked her tongue, and let go of him. He pulled his hand back as soon as he could.

“Sorry if I insulted you, but what was that about? Why did you just have me feel you like that? Is there something I'm missing here?”

She was standing next to the bed now, stretching and making sure to arch her back to accentuate that small little bump. “Oh, nothing. I hope your mind fixes itself here soon, or else I might just sleep in the guest room by myself all the time.” He gave her a blank look, and she sighed. “You just called me fat. I'm not. Well, that's a lie, I kind of am, but that's half your fault.”

“Do I make really good food or something? You can just resist cooking, if that's the case. If it's not, I'm really not sure what's going on here, and it's beginning to worry me.” Equius got off of the bed and approached her, his arms opened slightly. “Will a hug fix things?”

“Not quite. You'll probably hurt me if you hug me, and I don't want to be hurt.” She scrunched her nose and looked at him with her big brown eyes. “However, if you want to cradle me in your arms, provided that you don't drop me, that is more than allowed.” He obliged, scooping her up and carrying her down the flight of stairs in front of their bedroom door.

When he got to the floor below, he looked her straight in her eyes and asked, “So, what's with the belly, huh? Is it my cooking? Please tell me it's my cooking.”

“Equius, sweetie, you don't cook.” His face fell and he looked positively heartbroken. “Oh, don't be sad! You help me make cookies sometime, and they're always better when you help! But this little thing isn't because of cooking, so don't worry.”

“Not cooking? Are you just lazy? Is that it?”

She giggled, sounding like a windchime blowing in a gentle breeze. “Well, you see, when a husband and a wife love each other very much, like we do, they sometimes have fun in the bedroom, like we have, and they make babies.” Her hand quite protectively touched her stomach. “And the unborn babies stay in the wife until they're big enough to live outside in the world.” He gave her yet another blank look and she just smiled back. “We, as in me and you, are going to be parents. Do you remember this yet?”

“So I wake up thinking I'm a single guy, and within ten minutes of being awake, I'm told I'm married with a kid on the way. This day is not going very well.” He set her down, allowing her to grab the phone and call his job, while he grumbled about the situation. “Like, how do I not remember this at all? You mentioned a weight. Was that it?”

“Yes! You've had memory problems since you were knocked out while at the gym. First you didn't remember me because of my hair being red. Then I lost the red and you remembered me, but things were somewhat sketchy and you have days like this where you don't remember anything at all, not even meeting me.” Aradia put the phone back on the receiver after her call and gave Equius a warm look. “In fact, as you told me the last time this happened, you think you've just turned twenty. Isn't that right?”

“Are you telling me that I'm older than that? Because,” he looked down at himself, “I honestly look a lot better than I remember looking.”

She nodded at to answer question. “Right. You haven't been twenty in ten years.”

“This makes no sense to me, ma'am. I don't know who you are, or if I should be believing you about any of this, because it all seems so weird.” Even though he wasn't near a chair, he sat down, his back up against a wall. “Your name is Aradia, right? That's what you said?”

“Yes, my name is Aradia. However, you didn't even know I existed until eight years ago...and with your current mind state being stuck ten years ago, I'm absolutely nothing to you.” She crossed her arms over her chest and looked him straight in his dark eyes. “But when you wake up tomorrow morning, you'll remember me and everything will be just fine.”

His agreement to that was to ask her to sit down next to him and tell her all about his life, and she obliged, because on this particular day, there wasn't much else to do besides talk to him about everything that he asked, and answer all of his questions truthfully. She learned her lesson during the two months where she was nothing to him: if you want them to understand, just tell them everything you can. And she did, going into details about things that normally seemed so trivial to her, because he didn't know anything about her.

That was, until he woke her up the next morning with a kiss and she knew that he was back to normal, at least for the moment.

The next time he lost his memory was a few weeks later, and, like was usual, she began explaining things to him. He was more quick to believe her about it this time, even if she was still a stranger to him. “Does my father know about this?” he asked her, motioning towards the phone that she held in her hand. “Or is he in the dark?”

“What are you asking about? Your memory problems? He knows about those. He came and stayed here for a week when you first had your accident.” His head shook, and his eyes drifted to her stomach, which was slightly bigger than the last time. “Oh, that. No, he doesn't know about it, and I'd rather not tell him. He's a busy guy, owning a cow and stuff. He doesn't have the time to come visit right now.”

“Tell my father. He needs to know, if what you say is true and that is really my child in there.” She sighed and dialed in the number, not wanting to do it, but if that's what he wanted, then so be it. It needed to be done. When she hung up some fifteen minutes later, her spirits were crushed and she was quite unhappy with the situation. “How did it go? Did he believe you?”

“Yes, he believed me. He'll be here in two weeks for a visit. And, just because you caused this to happen, I'm inviting my mom to come over the day he gets here.” Aradia gave a small smile, causing Equius to groan a little. “Hey! Be nice! You don't even know my mom!”

His groaning became a little louder. “But I don't even know you, and I'd rather not meet your mom so soon into our relationship.”

“You've met her a million times before! And, most likely, the day she comes over, you'll remember her and be friendly and the you that I love!”

* * *

What Aradia said couldn't have been more true. The day that Equius' dad arrived, she was woken up with a kiss and a stomach rub, which made her very happy. The last thing she wanted on this particular day was him to not know who she was at all. However, the knock at the door that signified someone's appearance surprised him. “Are we supposed to be having company today?” he asked, getting out of bed and putting a pair of pants on. “Or is there a package coming, or what?”

“You don't remember, right. Your dad's going to be staying with us for a few days, and,” she looked at him and his shocked expression, “before you whine that it's my fault, you're the one who told me to call him.”

“That must have been while I was out of my mind, because the last thing I want is for my father to start scaring you with stories...”

She laughed, herself getting out of bed and throwing the nearest clothes on. “There's nothing he can say that can scare me. He's a guy. My mom, however, she could probably wreck my shit if I'm not careful.” The look he gave her for her use of a curse was one of disgust, but she just laughed it off. “I'm just saying, your dad doesn't scare me at all. Mom, however, does.”

“Well, since you'll be taking your time to get ready, I assume, I'll just go let my father in. He'll be happy to see me, I'm sure.” With that (and a blown kiss), he left the room and ran down the stairs, leaving Aradia to her own in the bedroom. She stood there for a few moments, just smiling at how things were actually going okay that day. When she went to leave, though, she caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror and frowned.

What had happened to the her that she used to stare at all the time? The her that always had a carefree smile and a glint in her eyes that spelled trouble? This her was much more mature, creases and wrinkles on her face from the stresses she had endured, lack of life in her long wavy hair that once was vibrant and red. And that was just looking at her head. As her eyes shifted downward, she caught herself focusing on her stomach, which she attempted to awkwardly cover with her hands. It was getting to the point where that was becoming impossible, and it actually saddened her a bit. The last thing she had ever wanted in life was a kid, and that's exactly what she was going to get. Add in the fact that the man she loved, this future child's father, didn't remember anything some days, and it was just a huge disaster she wanted no part of.

“Aradia, dear, are you coming down here?” she heard Equius calling up the stairs. She left the room and came down to the main floor, where he wrapped an arm around her. “Good to see you. Look who arrived at the same time.” He escorted her to the back sitting room, where her mom and his dad sat, on separate couches. They both stood when they saw her.

Her mom got to her first, grabbing her into a hug. “Hello there, darling,” she said in a quiet voice, “it's amazing to see you, and you look great. Thank you for inviting me over.”

“Oh, Ariel, don't be thanking her. She's a good girl, and she knows that it's nice for some family time every once in a while.” Equius' dad was a tall man, and even though he was getting on in years, he held youth in his every word and movement, as shown by his hug of everyone, and his later picking up of Aradia. “Your mother compliments you, but I'll just say that you make for an excellent weight for lifting!”

“Excuse you, Aurthour, but you don't tell someone in her state something like that. I know that, if I was in her position, I would smack you right away.” Soft-spoken or not, Ariel Megido did not tolerate any sort of rudeness from anyone. And when Aradia's feet were back on the ground, she was protectively standing in front of her daughter. “I cannot believe you would ever say such a thing.”

“He always calls me that, mom.” Aradia gently pushed her mother to the side and stepped closer to the silver-haired man. “He used to lift me over his head all the time, because I'm perfect for that and he knows it.”

Aurthour Zahhak looked between Aradia and her mother for a few moments, before erupting into coarse laughter. “She's quite the perfect weight, no matter what. She doesn't fight, and is much easier on the hands and eyes than your typical weight.” He sat back down, wiping tears from his eyes. “Come, all of you, and sit. I have a story to tell.”

“Oh, how wonderful. We're going to be subjected to a story about his cow and how hard it is to milk her. Let me warn you two, this one ends well.” Aradia's mom took a seat back on the other couch, where she propped her feet up on the spot that Aradia herself was going to take. “Nope, missy. You see me quite frequently. Sit next to Aurthour, I dare you.”

When she looked to see just how close she'd be sitting to the man, Aradia was quite thankful to notice that Equius had taken the middle spot on that couch, leaving the far end for her. She silently thanked him for that and sat down. “Okay, now that you're all seated, I want to ask you two lovebirds something.” Aurthour leaned forward a bit and looked Aradia and Equius both in the faces. “Do you know what else makes a good weight?”

“A weight. At the gym. You know, the thing I dropped on my head?” He wasn't always big on snarky or sarcastic responses to things, but when Equius said that, Aradia could see a small smile forming on his lips. “But I'm sure your answer is a cow. Father, were you lifting your cow?”

“That depends, son. Have you ever been a cow in your life?” The room became silent, but only after there were three distinct gasps. “The answer to that is no. You have never been a cow.”

Equius shook his head in confusion as to how he should react. “I'm sorry, but are you saying that I used to be a good weight? Father, did you throw me and lift me and such?”

“No, that is not what I'm saying. What kind of good father would I have been if I had done that? I'm just saying, when you were little, you were a big boy.” Leaning forward a bit more, Aurthour's eyes focused more on his son than Aradia. “And I would not be surprised at all if all my grandchildren are as big as you were.”

“How big are we talking?” Aradia asked, her voice wavering a bit as she attached herself to Equius' arm. “Like, I'm pretty small, so we can't be saying anything extreme, right?”

From her seat on the other couch, Ariel laughed. “Oh, sweetie, size doesn't matter. What does matter is how big of a lie Aurthour there is telling all of us. Sure, Equius is a nice sized guy, but I'm sure he was just as small as you were when I held you the first time, Aradia!”

“I doubt that. Truly doubt that. Unless she was a big girl herself and you're the one that's lying.”

Before a fight could break out between the two elders, Equius gave his father a stern look and simply asked, “How big was I, father?”

“Just over ten pounds, my boy! And you were the best-looking kid in the place!” Aurthour laughed, wrapping an arm around Equius. “But I'm sure you just aren't capable of making something that size. After all, that would break little Aradia there in half!”

Her eyes very large in fear, Aradia looked to her mom. “You were being serious about me being small, right, Mom?”

“That I was, dearie. You were a little thing. Your dad and I were so happy to have a small child to take care of...not a behemoth like what they had to take care of. Just keep your hopes up and pray for the middle ground.”

“It's not going to happen, Ariel. Zahhak kids are always big, and that's that. It doesn't matter what you say. She's going to be popping out a kid that's figuratively half her size, and that's that.” As he said that, Aradia could feel her jaw dropping, and she instinctively covered her stomach with both arms. “Okay, bit of a lie here. But it's going to be like my cow. You'll think it's all fine and dandy, and then you get more then you asked for. But hey, with my cow, I got a lot of milk, so maybe it'll be the same here.”

Needless to say, the rest of Aurthour's visit was full of cow comments and a lot of worrying by Aradia, who took a lot of his statements to heart.

* * *

Several months later, on a particularly warm early fall day, there was an unexpected knock at their front door, prompting them both to worry that it was the return of the cow jokes. “I'll check the door, you hide in the guest room, and if it's my father, I will politely tell him to go back home to his precious cow. We don't need him here causing more trouble, not now.” Equius gently kissed Aradia's cheek and ran to the door, while she made her way to the spare bedroom. She couldn't have been in there more than a few seconds before she heard something hit the floor. Hard.

As fast as she could, she went back to the main room, where she found Equius on the ground, a small ginger woman on top of him. “Nepeta! Why are you here? Better yet, why didn't you warn us?”

“Sorry, Aradia, but this was an unexpected trip out here, and I didn't have a number that worked for my best friend here, so I figured I'd just drop by. After all, it's not every day that I'm here, and...” Her chipper voice trailed off as she climbed off of the man and got a good look at Aradia. “I, uh, wow. Why wasn't I told that you two were expecting?”

Picking himself up, Equius corrected his friend. “She's the one who's expecting, to be honest. I'm just the father.”

“Sorry, mister correcty-pants!” Nepeta purred, pressing her shoulder up against his side. “But why don't I hear about these things? I want to be the godmother!” Forgetting completely that she was pretending to be an attention-seeking cat, she jumped at Aradia and hugged her quite large stomach. “Hi little baby. I'm Nepeta. I'm awesome. I hope you'll play games with me and be even half as cool as your dad.”

Both Equius and Aradia started blushing at this display of affection, but one was out of embarrassment and the other was out of the compliment. “Excuse me, Nepeta, but I don't let anyone do that. Not even Equius. I'd really appreciate it if you got off...”

“Let her stay on. She won't bruise you, like I would.”

“I don't even let Boots and Dora cling to me like this, and they're little. Come on. She needs to get off.” Aradia pushed Nepeta a little bit, but she just attached herself even more. “Okay, whatever. I'm calling someone to come save me from her, because I'm not putting up with this.” Slowly, due to the fact that Nepeta just wouldn't let go, she made her way to the phone, which she picked up and used to call Dave, who, as predicted didn't answer.

He normally didn't answer on the first try, though, and so she tried again. Nothing. The third time, she wasn't even sure if there was an answer or not, because the moment she put it to her ear, Nepeta started talking cutesy things and that was so much of a distraction that she hung up after one ring. “Okay, fine, she can do this and I will just take it. That's cool.”

“You do realize that, if you were trying to call Dave, he's at a wedding right now, right?” Equius took a look at Aradia's displeased face and gave her a small smile. “That sister of his, the one you've told me so much about, she's off getting married today. And he's there right now.”

“I'm bummed about that, to be honest,” Nepeta said, finally standing upright and backing away from everyone. “I wanted to see him and the little girls. I've heard so much about them from you guys, and they sound amazing. Also, I wanted to get into a bit of a footrace with him, you know, test out my cat-like abilities.”

Thankful to not have anyone on her anymore, Aradia found herself a chair and sat down, the phone still in her hand. “Well, that's just too bad for you, Nepeta. Sorry that you came at the wrong time for you to go have a little race with your old gym buddy.”

“He wasn't ever my gym buddy! I just saw him all the time out on the track, that's all. We'd race each other and he'd always win, but I am ready to win against him for once!” She jumped and laughed, before purring like the cat she felt she was. “But since he's busy, I can just spend the entire day here with you two!”

Although Equius tried to seem happy about that, Aradia just couldn't, dropping the phone and burying her face in her hands. Of all the things that could go wrong, aside from cow jokes, this had to be the worst. Yeah, she loved Nepeta and was glad that her and Equius were such great friends, but she was not in the mood for this. She never was. If it wasn't one thing, it was another. If it wasn't Equius with no memory, it was his dad and those stupid cow jokes, and if it wasn't that, then it was a visitor she really would rather not have. 

But she plastered a fake smile on her face and endured the rest of that day the best that she could, even though Nepeta insisted on more clinging that she definitely didn't want. This was bad, yes, but it could have been worse. After all, it could have been a day where Equius didn't know what was going on around him.

No, whatever supreme being there was decided that _that_ punishment could be given to Aradia on the one day where she really needed her Equius there beside her, the day where she woke up and everything just felt off. “Could you maybe get up so we can get going or something?” she asked, poking him in the face for once. She wasn't sure if he was even awake when she did that, but she needed him up then. Something wasn't right in her world.

“Excuse me, but are you Aradia?” he replied, yawning and sitting up. “Why are you in my bed? I just met you, and I think this is crazy, but you're in my bed, so I'm calling the cops.” He jumped up, the vibrations in the bed making her feel even worse. “Drunk ladies don't belong in my—“ His statement trailed off when he looked at her. “—what happened to you?”

“Equius, you aren't going to believe a word I'm about to say, but I'm your wife. We've been married for over four years now, and you had a gym accident over a year ago and you sometimes don't remember me. This is one such day, and I really need you to do something for me, okay?” He gave a small nod, his eyes darting side to side in a bit of a panic. “I need you to call a friend. Someone who can drive.”

A smile lit up his normally cold face. “Nepeta! She can drive! I'll go call her!”

“Not her. She lives like three hours away and that's too much time. Call someone else. Maybe Dave. He would be willing to help here.”

“All he's good for is introducing us and running. I'll call Vriska. She'll answer, first ring. Of course, she'll be surprised when I'm calling her for a non-workout related reason, but whatever.” He stepped closer to the door. “You met her, right?”

“Yes, I know Vriska, but she won't answer. She doesn't live anywhere near here anymore, deciding that her new boyfriend is more important than friends.” Equius' mouth widened at that, and Aradia remembered that she was talking to a version of him who didn't know any of this. “Just trust me and call Dave. Please.”

After a few more minutes of naming old friends who weren't useful, she finally convinced him to go, leaving her laying in the bed alone. She wasn't really hurting, but there was just something that felt weird about the situation, and she figured that playing it safe was best. By the time that she was able to pull herself out of bed, he was back up in the room. “Okay, he's coming here for you. I also took the liberty of calling my father and telling him about this. He thinks I'm insane, but I'm not really, am I?”

“No, of course not, sweetie. You're just not yourself today.” She reached out for his arm for support; he in turn handed her the phone. “Um, Equius, can you help me?”

“Why would I help you? You're the crazy one here, thinking we're married and such. Are you just trying to delude yourself into that? What, did your child's father run out on you or something? Are you attempting to replace him with me?” His eyes had a glint of disdain in them, which honestly scared Aradia. “Come on, truth time.”

“Equius, I swear to you that I've told you the truth. We're married. You're my child's father, and if you hadn't been so obsessed with the stupid gym, you'd remember this. You'd remember me. Instead, you won't have a single memory of this day. And if everything else that I'm expecting to happen just happens to happen to me today, then you're not going to remember any of that, either. Look me in the eyes, Equius.” She was crying, she knew, and he was angry because of something, but they made eye contact and she gave a big fake smile. “You have to remember. Today is not the day you need to be forgetting.”

In the end, though, it didn't matter that he was convinced they had just met. It didn't matter that it was Dave taking them over to the hospital, making jokes the entire time about how he hadn't ever wanted to make that trip again, and yet there he was. It didn't matter that Aradia, the worse and worse things got, had to explain everything, instead of having someone explaining it for her.

It just mattered that, thanks to her being stuck through over a day of labor, her Equius was there by her side when both of their lives changed forever. And, with their baby's very first scream, something big happened. Something in his mind just clicked, and he never had a day where he didn't remember his wife or family again.


	3. The Exploration of Equius’ Memories

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A little look into the past, a time where Equius knew exactly who he was, and into a more recent time, where he deals with things so unlike what he once knew.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is literally both a prequel to the other parts and a middle companion piece to the last one. It showcases the differences in times, from when Equius was younger to when he is in the throes of his memory problems--although not directly dealing with them that particular day.

The gym was very much a safe haven to Equius, who would go there almost religiously to escape the real life he had outside of the glass walls and exercise machines. He hated work, hated having to get money when his dad could just give him some, and he especially hated living on his own when he had very few friends to keep him company. Those few friends he did have were in a similar position to him: working but spending their free time at the gym, although not nearly as obsessively as him.

On his “normal” days, he would show up at the average person's dinner time, when the place was empty aside from a select group of people. Those people he was okay with having around, and he enjoyed having them there while he lifted his weights. There was Vriska, his spotter and, although she worked at the gym, he considered her a friend who helped him as much as he helped her; Terezi, the towel girl who worked to clean the machines when not in use, who enjoyed watching the people out on the track even with her failing eyesight; Dave, who would be one of those track runners found out there only in the evening, when it was cool; and Nepeta, who was Equius's best friend in the whole world, but couldn't stand weightlifting, so she chose to hang out near the track, challenging whoever she could find. There were other people who came and went at this time, but those four were always there without fail, and if they were gone, something big had to be going on.

On one particular night, Equius showed up at the same time he always did, prepared for a night of routine work, and was shocked to find some scrawny man messing with his weight set. “Vriska,” he said with clenched teeth as he approached the blonde woman at the help desk, “why is that kid on my equipment? This is my time to use it, so please make him leave.”

“Sorry, can't do that,” she replied, rolling her bright blue eyes and laughing. “New people are trying everything out today, and, well, we need to know if they'll be satisfied enough for a membership or not.”

“But Vriska, those are my weights, and he is going to be ruining them. Please make him back away and play with other weights.”

She shook her head and began to glare at him, unafraid of his muscular build. “No. Now drop it, Equius. And if you even think of arguing back, I will stop my free spotting services with you, and I might kick you to the curb in the process.” When she lifted her arm and flexed her muscles, he took a few steps away from her, wondering why he even put up with her. “Just come back in like half an hour. He'll be long gone by then, and Terezi will have cleaned the weights for you and everything.”

“Yes, yes, sounds great. Thank you.” He nodded these thanks at her before sighing and leaving the weight room, heading through the big glass doors to the back of the property, where the track was slowly being enveloped in darkness. He was pleased to see two people that he knew making laps on the track—a blonde man with a ginger woman chasing him. As he stood and watched, the man made a huge lead on the woman before she stopped dead in her tracks, falling to the ground in defeat.

“You win again,” she panted out, waving a tanned arm in the air as both Equius and the blonde guy came to her. “I hear footsteps. Who's trying to help me? Nepeta Leijon doesn't need help with anything except maybe winning a race.”

The blond man chuckled. “Yeah, that's all you need help with. Maybe next time you choose to challenge me, you should pick a time of day I'm not good at running in.”

“But Dave, you're only here at this time, just like me!” She brought herself back to her feet, turning to look at the one she called Dave before noticing Equius was standing there as well. “Oh, hey there best friend! What are you doing out here like a running loser like us?”

“Passing the time while Vriska allows some uneducated man use my weights. She's so picky about which rules she follows. When it comes to maximum weight limits, she doesn't care, but when it comes to making the gym money, she cares.” He looked between the two tired, out-of-breath people he was with. “Why do you two even pay to come here, when all you do is run out here? Aren't there other tracks you can use?”

Pulling the headband that held his hair in place down a bit, Dave cracked a small smile. “There are, sure, but then we have to worry about brats getting in our way. Here, no kids can be members without good reason. That means no kids can trip us up while we act like we're in middle school. It's a great trade-off, money for freedom.”

“And also this place actually takes care of their track. You remember the last time I ran on a public track, don't you, Equius?” He nodded and said he did, which was a true statement. He could easily remember the blood and scrapes that covered her legs from the nasty fall she took when she stepped in a pothole on the running surface. “I am never ever doing that again. Believe me.”

“Besides, if we weren't here, who would you talk to at a moment like this? The blind chick? The big bitch? Not much choice, is there?”

“I find Vriska and Terezi both make excellent company, if you talk to them about the correct topics. I can engage Vriska in conversations about her thoughts on regulations and such, and Terezi...if I just flex a bit, she'll talk to me for hours.” Equius took the glasses he had hanging on his shirt and put them on his face, giving a grin when he did so. “What can I say? Women love me.”

Dave snorted, and Nepeta giggled a bit. “Keep telling yourself that, okay? Maybe one of these days you'll hear them calling you names, and you'll step off your high horse.”

“What Dave said, but I don't think you should get off the horse. Maybe you should just make the horse shorter.” Another round of giggles came from Nepeta. “Or, better yet, you can take the horse to your dad and he can teach you how to make it better.”

“There is no horse, and even if there was, I would never take it to my father. He would probably marry it, knowing him.” There was an overwhelming sense of both embarrassment and disappointment in Equius' voice as he said that. “And, besides, I would never go to him willingly. I like keeping my distance from that man.”

Playfully hitting his arm, Nepeta rolled her eyes at his response. “Equius! That is your dad you are talking about! Yeah, so maybe he's really creepy, and that's even being compared to you, and maybe he's obsessed with calling me and asking if I'm dating you...” She shook her head and stuck her tongue out. “I should have never given him my number. Ever. He's really clingy and I don't like him very much. But I'm allowed to not like him! You're his son, and you have to love him!”

“I am not going to love him, not when he asks me strange questions about my personal life, and tries to hook me up with my best friend. If I'm going to fall in love, I'm going to do it on my own terms.” Equius looked to Dave for some input, but the blonde was too busy staring at someone washing the glass door back into the gym. “Excuse me, Strider? What are you doing?”

“Have you ever taken the time to admire the blind one's ass? She's got a fine piece of meat on her, that's for sure.” That comment earned him a smack from Nepeta, who then had to duck and dodge an elbow from Dave. “Sorry, got distracted by her beauty. What's up? Why do you need me?”

Equius sighed. “I'm not repeating myself, but the gist was that I am not being forced into love. Do you agree or not?”

“Yeah, don't fall for the temptations of having someone tell you who to love. Personally, I think I'm going to fall in love with that gorgeous woman, but I'm not going to tell you to go bang Vriska or anything like that. Ew.” A sneaky small smile appeared on Dave's lips, and he excused himself from the group, walking over to the door where Terezi was cleaning and began a conversation with her.

“Okay, he's gone. I'm going inside and changing into decent clothes for walking around in. Care to join me in a journey to the front of the building?” Nepeta forced her hand into Equius' and squeezed his, before dragging him along with her from the track to the gym's front entrance—something she did every day because the women's locker room was closer to the front of the building than the back. When they got back inside she thanked him for his company and disappeared into the unknowns of rooms he'd never been in.

With a turn of his head, Equius saw that his weights were left alone, and they seemed to be cleaned. From her position at the help desk, Vriska said, “They're usable. Go for it before another newbie gets to them.” A quiet nod in her direction later, and he was beginning to set up the set for his normal workout, when he heard footsteps come from behind him.

“Hi there,” a female voice he had never heard before said. It was sweet and kind and definitely not the voice of anyone that would be found at the gym. “Are you a regular here? Could you maybe show me around?”

“There's a blonde at the help desk to do that,” he replied, “so no. Sorry.”

Instead of hearing retreating footsteps, the woman didn't even move. “I went to her already. She said that you'd be a better help to me, and she told me how nice you are, so I figured that maybe you also worked here? But whatever, I guess. If she's not going to help, and you're not going to help, then I guess I'll just not come here. It's a shame. I mean, I already paid for a month...”

“You paid without even trying the place out?” He turned to look at this lady, who was much shorter than him, with long red hair that was flowing loosely. “You don't even look like the gym type. You're in over your head.”

“Oh am I? How are you going to judge me if you know nothing about me?”

The weight he was holding was set down, and he stood up and towered over her. “I know enough about you. You seem to be one of the ladies who comes in here, tries to do too much, and then leaves in tears. No wonder why Vriska wouldn't help you. She knows better than to waste her time on hopeless cases like you.”

“You're kind of mean, aren't you? Insulting a lady before you even know her name?”

“That was rather wrong of me, and I'm sorry. Let's try this over again. Hello, my name is Equius Zahhak. I am not going to help you, because it's not my job.”

She looked up at him and grinned. “Better, but still kind of mean. My name's Aradia. Aradia Megido. It's really nice to get to meet you, and maybe I'll be able to break you out of this grumpy shell you're in.”

“Yeah right,” he said with a laugh. “I doubt you'll do that. Just like I doubt you'll stick around here for more than tonight.” He motioned to the weight set he was setting up. “Know anything about those?”

“I sure do! See, you figured that I don't know a thing about gyms, when really, I know a lot about them. I'm just new around here, so this one's kind of strange to me. If you don't mind, I'd like to watch you lift for a bit, and then, maybe, could I try?” The fact that she treated him with kindness even after his rough greeting made him accept her, made him find her to be great company, and made him fall in love with her.

* * *

Fast forward to eight years later, in that same gym. Equius didn't still go there religiously, but he did come every once in a while, just to do what he used to do, with some changes. For one, his weight use was severely limited, due to his accident a year before when he had a weight dropped on his head due to his replacement spotter not paying enough attention. He didn't exactly remember the night, and just sitting on his weight bench, he stared longingly at the heavier weights and wished someone was around who would let him touch them.

A grunt from behind him when he did reach for one reminded him that the one person in the world who would have bent the rules and let him go wild was no longer working there. At the help desk, a grumpy guy who swore he had better things to do, someone with no interest whatsoever in the gym, was carefully watching Equius, making sure he followed the rules that had been left behind when Vriska had left her job there. She had quit months after the accident, not because of him, but because of her own personal reasons, and she had never once come back, the only remnant of her in this place being a note saying not to, under any circumstances, let Equius play with the big weights.

After a little bit of work with the ones he was allowed to touch, Equius decided that it was time to leave the gym, and go out to the track and see what, or who, was out there. Running alone was a blonde guy with a particular red headband, and when he saw the tall, dark man come outside, he stopped and approached him. “What's up? Why are you out here? Mister 'follow the rules or get the fuck out' get to you again? That guy rubs me the wrong way. Reminds me of the dude Nepeta ditched us for. Weren't they best friends or something?”

“Yes, but the one that works here is harder to deal with. At least Nepeta had the sense to be with someone who does have feelings that aren't brought on by a computer.” He looked down at the ground, kicking the track a bit with one foot. “I wish she could have stayed longer when she visited.”

“I hear you loud and clear. I wasn't even around to see her, and I had been wanting to race her again so badly.” Instead of also looking down, Dave looked straight up into the night sky. “She'll come back some day, though. She's got reason to, and that reason is me and you. Unlike Vris-bitch, you know?”

Equius kicked the ground a bit more. “She's got more than us to come back for. When she was here, she was really sad that she didn't get to see the girls.” That was when he looked back up, as Dave gave a loud sigh. “Yeah, yeah, I know. You were all at that wedding. I just can't believe she sprung a random visit on us the one time you're gone.”

“I can't believe she came last week and not this one. She should have asked me before she came, too. I mean, talked to her when I got home, she said it wasn't her choice, that it was the idea of the grouchy one, but I still want to see her.”

“If you had been around when she was, maybe it would have saved me from a lot of whining.” The comment confused Dave a bit, so he asked what, exactly, caused whining in that situation. “Oh, you know Nepeta. Clingy. Wanting attention. And you also know how Aradia is now, where she doesn't let anyone touch her. That was a lot of fun to deal with, let me tell you.”

“Did Nepeta know about the little Zahhak that's on the way, or was that a total surprise. Like, did she walk in and be like 'hey, wow, there's something weird about this place and it's totally not the fact that Aradia's like twice her size' or did she not even mention it or what?”

Equius blinked a couple times, remembering exactly how it went down, before giving an abridged version in response: “She figured it out the second she saw Aradia, and then she spent a good portion of the rest of the visit clinging to her like a cat starved for attention. It annoyed all of us, but she was just so excited for it that she didn't know how to handle herself.”

“Sounds like Nepeta, all right.” They stood there for a bit longer talking, before Dave started towards the building. “I've got to get home. You know how it is. The ladies are going to be mad that we're holding them up, and I doubt they're still over at the ice cream shop.” The logic there was infallible, and Equius followed the blonde back into the gym, and towards the front area, in front of the giant glass wall.

A screeching child was heard no sooner than they got within view of the front door, and, as Equius watched, Dave was attacked by two young girls. “Hey! I don't think you two are allowed in there!” Terezi said at the two girls, even though she was facing the complete wrong direction. “Get off your dad and back over here!”

“No, Terezi, it's cool. They're with me, and that means they're allowed. Besides,” Dave looked around and checked the completely empty gym, “there's no one here to care.”

“Okay, whatever, can we go home now? I've been with them for hours and I think I need to be washed because one of them spilled ice cream on me...”

The two girls let go of Dave and ran back to Terezi, and he took the opportunity to give Equius a small nod. “I'll see you around sometime soon, okay? Hopefully before, well, you know what happens, and you aren't here anymore.”

“What do you mean, not here anymore? I'll still be coming here twice a week, every week. What is going to happen to change that?” Dave motioned toward the door, where, on the other side, Aradia was standing, a finger twirling a lock of her brown hair while her other hand rested on her very large stomach. “Oh, yeah. That. Believe me when I say that I will still be here on my normal schedule, regardless of what happens with that.”

“I don't think you really get the grasp of being a father, then. It's a really, really stressful job, believe me. I wouldn't be pushing all that stress on Aradia, if I were you.” With that and another nod, Dave was gone, taking Terezi's hand and leading both her and their kids out of the gym and off into the night.

One deep sigh later, and Equius was making his way outside, where he was greeted with a kind hello from Aradia, followed by, “So, how was your alone time in the gym? Was it everything you wanted? Sorry I couldn't join you today. I really feel bad about choosing time with Terezi over time with you...”

“Don't be sorry, dear. It's really okay that you were with your friend, because I spent most of my time either with a friend of my own, or reminiscing about ones that aren't here anymore.”

Getting her hand out of her hair, Aradia grabbed Equius in an one-armed hug. “Oh, it's okay. You'll see your friends again someday, I know you will. Nepeta will come back to visit the second you tell her to, and I bet we'd be able to convince Vriska to come back. Don't be so down about them being gone, really!”

“It's not just them being gone that's bothering me, okay? I've been thinking a lot about old times, back when things were simple. I really miss being able to come into this place and do whatever I want, without anyone worrying about me getting hurt again. I miss having friends to talk to out on the track, and friends who were working inside that kept me company.”

He was going to add more, but Aradia stopped him. “You know, you do live in your memories sometimes. If I remember correctly, you're getting to the point where we meet. Do you remember that day at all? I do. I had just moved here, and I was starting at the gym, and there was this mean jerk who was so rude to me. And you know what? I ended up marrying that jerk.”

“I do remember that day. And I remember the next one, when Vriska teased me for 'crushing' on you when I had just met you. Now that I think about it, she's one to speak. She fell in love with that purple-haired guy the day she met him out there wherever she is.”

“Yeah, and she sent us a picture of them! We need to look at it when we get home!” With the cheer in her voice, Aradia sounded happy, but the cheer quickly turned to more of a whine. “Can we go home now, anyway? I've been out and about for hours now, and it's really tiring to be walking when I'm like this, and he's starting to move around a lot and you don't know pain until you have a kid kicking you in the ribs and there's nothing you can do about it.”

There might have been nothing he could do about it, but after promising her that they would be headed home in moments, he dropped to his knees, pressing his face up against her stomach. “Hey, you in there. Be nice, will you? I don't need you beating up your mom, because that means I'm going to beat you up, and I'm pretty sure you don't want me to do that.” He laughed, because making a threat at an unborn child really was silly, but he felt it needed to be done. “Now be good, and please decide that you want to meet us on a day that I'll remember you.”

The last line was probably the most serious thing he said right then, and it was the one thing that was almost completely ignored.

 


	4. The Growth of Vriska's Relationships

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A look into Vriska's life, after her existence helped shaped the relationship between Equius and Aradia--and her absence caused the memory-loss accident to occur. It may be a different town, with a different gym, but friends are friends and their stories intertwine and matter even when they're apart.

For being someone who had scorned her childhood, it was extremely strange for Vriska to be back anywhere inside the city limits of the place she used to call home, yet there she was, walking down the main street of the place, one of the few people she still spoke to from when she first lived there right next to her. If she was going to suffer, she was going to suffer with friends, and she was suffering enough just being there. To start, she hated the place. Then there was the fact that she had been forced to give up her good life and great friends to come back. And, on top of that, she was going to be stuck living in the house her crazy mother once lived in.

The situation was just terrible and both her and her friend Tavros, for her because of having to be back, for him because of having to deal with her. As he put it when he saw her get out of her car in front of her new place, she was a completely different person from the last time they had seen each other. And that meant that things were going to be different between them, even if he was still being an amazing friend to her.

“Why, what's the problem? Am I too pretty for a guy like you to be walking around with? Is that it?” she playfully asked, punching him in the shoulder as they walked down the main street. “Or is there something else? Do you have a girlfriend that's going to be mad you're with me?”

“No to the girlfriend question,” he replied, rubbing at where he had been punched, “and no, you're not too pretty. You're the perfect amount of pretty. It's just...you've changed a lot since you left, and I'm not sure I like it.”

She tilted her head and looked at him, a shocked expression upon her face. “I'm basically the same though, right? I mean, yeah, I'm older, wiser, and...” Her voice trailed off, and she turned away, eyes focusing on the ground. “I know what you're talking about now. This is about me being smaller now than I was when I graduated, isn't it?”

“Yeah, it is. This new you still has curves, I guess, but they're not the curves I remember my best friend having. Then again, you did say you worked at a gym back in that other town, so it makes sense that you've, uh, gotten smaller.” Having never been one with words, Tavros shut up then, hoping that he hadn't insulted his friend at all.

He hadn't, but when they reached their destination, a quaint diner on the end of the street, someone else did what he tried not to do. They stepped inside, her tall, slender frame foreign to the eyes of the people dining, and one person in particular noticed her, letting out a low whistle as he did so. Being used to a whistle meaning someone needed her assistance, Vriska searched the place for whoever did it, and she found reason to believe that a guy sitting at the counter who was staring straight at her was the culprit. “Hey, Tavros, who's that douche?” she asked, giving a little point in the guy's direction. “I think he's into me.”

“That? Wow, yeah, you wouldn't know him by sight, just like he probably doesn't realize that you're you. Remember stick-thin and scrawny Eridan from school? That's him.” Vriska felt her jaw drop slightly at that news. She did indeed remember that kid, and there was no way that the other social outcast of the school was the guy she was staring at. Then again, she was positive that he didn't recognize that she had once been his friend, mostly because when they had known each other, she was heavy-set and not even close to pretty. “Why don't you go talk to him? I, um, see someone I'd like to talk to, so...”

She tried to tell who he was looking at, but there were too many people in the direction that he was looking. “Okay, have fun talking to whoever, I guess. I'm going to try and talk to who you say is Eridan, but I really doubt it's him.”

“Oh, believe me, it's him.” Without another word, Tavros walked over to a table where a black-haired duo sat, leaving her to awkwardly approach the guy at the counter. She was nervous, and to say that was an understatement. Guys never really did interest her, and the ones that did were always taken, so she wasn't sure how to act around a guy who might like her.

The way to do it obviously didn't involve tripping and accidentally elbowing him right where it hurt most. He screamed, she frantically apologized, and a big scene was made of the incident, which disrupted everyone who was eating as well as a couple of the workers. “I'm so sorry!” she said for what was probably the tenth time. “I didn't realize there was a chair leg there and...this is all my fault!”

“Damn right, it's your fault,” the guy hissed through his pain. “What a way to make a first impression, dumbass.”

“You're gonna be fine, though.” Vriska flipped her hair, which was neatly kept in a ponytail, and tried to be rude right back. “I've seen guys get racked by weight benches. As I'm not nearly as heavy, there's no way I hurt you terribly bad.”

The guy stopped his whining right then, after having heard her voice clearly, and by the shocked look on his face and the way he was examining her from head to toe, he had recognized her somehow. “Unless I'm mistaken, you're the girl formerly known as fatass Vriska, aren't you?”

“One and only. And you're skinny-as-fuck Eridan. Nice to see that you've got some meat on your bones. Just wish I hadn't learned that because of hitting you.” She gave him what was probably the most spiteful smile she had ever given. “How's life treating you, now that you weigh more than a pencil?”

“Probably better than yours has, since you did just admit to spending all your time at the gym. I wouldn't be caught dead in one of those. But you must have needed special help—when was the first time you were able to see one of your feet without a crane helping you?” When Vriska raised an arm to elbow him again, he awkwardly laughed. “Jokin', jokin'. But seriously. My life's been okay. How's yours?”

“Pretty fucking sucktacular. And that's not because of being at the gym. I worked at that place for a long time. Helped guys out. Made some friends.” She sighed, before hopping up on the seat next to his. “But, as I'm sure you know, my mom went crazy, died, and now I'm stuck back in this town where everyone seems to remember me as I was the day I graduated. And that, Eridan, is my life in a nutshell.”

He snorted, leaning a bit closer to her. “Sounds lovely. Mine's better. Learned to swim, became a lifeguard, and that's it.” Something hit the back of his head then, and he spun on his seat to face the culprit of throwing it—or culprits, as he learned. Vriska looked at them as well, and was surprised to see that Tavros was among the four people at the table where the object had come from. “Hey guys, I'm finally gettin' my talk on with a girl. Don't fuck this up for me.”

“Oh, are you now?” the person sitting closest to them at that table, a lady with obnoxiously pink hair, laughed at Eridan's comment. “I didn't think that you were capable of that! Carry on.”

“Who's she?” Vriska asked once they were turned back around. “And why is she such a bitch?”

After a moment of grumbling and politely asking not to call her a bitch, he answered with, “That's my best friend. Feferi's her name. And she's not a bitch. She's far from one. Fef's the nicest person around, but she's in a hard spot right now.”

“What kind of hard spot can she be in? She lives here.”

“Well, I'm not supposed to be talkin' about this, but her and those other folks she's sittin' with are in a bit of a relationship crisis right now. The middle lady back there, her name's Jade, and she's madly in love with all of them—and they're madly in love back at her.” They turned to catch Feferi pointing and laughing at Vriska, which made the other two at the table who weren't Tavros to laugh as well. Turning back once more, he continued. “That guy who's attached to Jade like a magnet, he's John. He's like her best-friend-turned-lover or somethin' weird like that. And you know Tav, but he's into Jade too. Bit out of his league, I'm afraid.”

“She's got a harem going there. I'm sure he could do better than her.” Giving just one last look back at that group, Vriska sighed. “He's still getting more action there than I ever have.”

Eridan chuckled at that. “If you hadn't spent all of high school lookin' like a small whale, maybe you would have had a boyfriend or two or five. You're a pretty lady, miss Vris, and no that is not me hittin' on you. That is me statin' a fact.” He playfully pushed her shoulder, and she pushed him back. “Oh, playful are you? Care to take this outside?”

“That sounds like you're hitting on me. No, let's stay here. It's been a while since I talked to someone I'm not familiar with, so how about it? You said you're a lifeguard, right? Tell me more. I'm interested.”

He obliged, and as they talked, at their table, the wheels started turning in Feferi's head as she watched her best friend talk to the newbie who wasn't that much of a newbie. “I think I've got a way to settle this whole love problem,” she said, looking between her companions, “and it involves getting those two to hook up.”

“I'm up for that. We get Eridan some chick to bang, he won't hang around us like a lost animal, and we definitely don't need to be dealing with more animals than we already do.”

“But with Vriska? She's not exactly, uh, his kind of girl. He likes the ones he can cling to. You cling to her and she'll break your neck...”  
The dark-haired one known as Jade slammed her hand down on their table to silence everyone. “As the leader here, I say we play with Feferi's idea. You three work on hooking those two up. Whoever is able to make it happen gets to date me, easy as that.”

“Consider you mine then, because I can make my best friend do whatever I want if it means I'm happy.” Feferi beamed, and the two guys in the group sighed. She was right, Eridan was very easy to be controlled by her and her pink hair, and that meant that there was going to be very little chance for either of them to get to date Jade.

Or so they thought.

* * *

Weeks went by and Vriska and Eridan spent more time together, just talking and catching up with each other, and even though their previous relationship had been terrible at best, Vriska knew that she had fallen for him, and hard. Yet they fought quite often, and most always in the vicinity of someone who was involved in the deal with Jade, who then believed that the entire ordeal was hopeless. Even though Vriska knew she had feelings for him, they saweach other nearly every day, with no romantic progression beyond a couple ill-timed flirtation attempts on Eridan's end.

That all changed one bright and sunny day, when they were hanging out for a few minutes before Eridan had to go to work—after all, it was hot, and the local swimming pool needed as many of its lifeguards as possible. This particular pool happened to be located in the same building as a small gym, and it was there that they chose to hang out, watching the people working out as they talked. “This place makes me really miss back where I used to live,” Vriska said with a small sigh. “Except back there, I'd be working the machines with people, not just sitting around watching them.”

“You could always, yanno, apply for a job here. I'd love to be workin' with you, even if you'd be in there and I'd be across the hall.” He shrugged, before reaching for her hand, grabbing it and lacing his fingers between hers. “It would be great for the gym, too. Nothin' but lunatics work the place, and they need experience like you.”

“Are you holding my hand?” They both looked down after she rather loudly exclaimed that, and there they saw that he was indeed holding her hand. “Eridan, what's this about? Are you trying to tell me something?”

“I guess I might be...” He blushed, trying to cover his face with his free hand. “You don't seem to like it when I flat-out hit on you, so maybe this way will be a little bit different.”

She pulled her hand away from his faster than anyone could blink. “I'd rather you not hit on me this way either, Eridan. It's stupid. And, to get back to what we were talking about before your idiotic interruption, I won't apply here. I've got a much better job lying around for me, and it involves all the dress-making stuff my mom left in her house.”

“So you aren't gonna come work with me?”

“Not in this lifetime. Now get your ass to work, and don't plan on seeing me again until you're done being all lovey towards me. I don't want a relationship.” She stood up, gave him a rather angry wave, and walked off, leaving him alone to sigh before going to do what he was there for. And from her spot at the building's smoothie bar, Feferi, having watched the entire exchange, shook her head and muttered to herself that there was no way, none at all, that those two would be getting together.

* * *

“So you're goin' to make this place into a dress shop, huh?” It was no more than two days later, and whatever animosity Vriska had expressed towards Eridan back at his work was gone, as she had invited him to her mom's old house to help her clean. “Isn't that what your mom tried to do?”

The blonde, her hair kept in a messy ponytail for the moment, nodded, before handing him a box filled with fabrics. “Actually, she ran a shop, but by the time she got customers, she was too insane to remember the orders. So there's all this stuff still here that's completely usable, and I'm gonna fulfill her dream. I'm gonna do it.”

“Have you ever even made a dress before, Vriska?” Eridan set the box down on the shelf where she directed him to put it, before being handed another. “I don't think you should do this if you've never done it before.”

“Actually, I've made two dresses before. No big deal. They were fancy, top-quality wedding gowns for people I knew. Free of charge. I guess that the one good thing I got from my mom was my ability to make dresses.” Rummaging through one of the countless unmarked boxes, she pulled out a little doll that looked to be hand-sewn and badly made. “Hey, I remember this guy. First doll I ever made on my own. Mom said he was the cutest thing she'd ever seen.”

Before he realized it, the little doll was being thrown at his head, and Eridan grabbed it at the last second before it would have made impact. “Wow, this is pretty neat, Vris,” he told her while looking at it. “Can't believe a little you would have made such a thing. But okay, you've made some dresses. Does that really mean you can run a shop?”

“Like I said, two top-quality gowns that were better than anything at bridal shops. I think I can handle reopening what was once known as Arachne's Dresses. Even though I'm pretty fucking sure I'm gonna call it something better than my stupid mom's fucking name.” She went back to digging through the box, and Eridan, putting the doll down somewhere high and visible from everywhere, stepped a bit closer to her, before forcefully smacking her ass. “Hey! Watch it! You shouldn't be touching me there!”  
“Sorry, Vris, but your ass is stickin' out so fuckin' far I couldn't resist.” He shot her one of the biggest shit-eating grins he could muster, but even that couldn't save him from being kicked out of her house. John, who happened to be walking by right as Eridan grumbled and walked down the front path, sighed at the sight, because he knew that it didn't look good for any relationship to be happening there. And no relationship between them meant no possible relationship between him and Jade, and that was not cool at all.

* * *

It had to have been at least three months since Vriska had moved back to this town, and yet her and Eridan were still in the stagnant and awkward friendship that they had been in since she had shown up. “Do you think someone out there likes me?” she bluntly asked him, her chin cradled in her hands with her elbows resting on the side of the pool, as he sat in his lifeguard chair. “Or am I just going to be alone forever?”

“I'm not just sayin' this, but I know there's someone out there who likes you. And if you'd just open your eyes, you'd see that.”

“Someone? Yeah right.” She kicked her feet a bit, splashing some kids who were swimming behind her. “If there's someone, I'd like them to come tell me. Spoken or written. I don't care. I just know that there's no one out there who likes me. Everyone knows it, actually. I was told just this morning by someone who really cares about me as a person that there's probably no one out there who would admit to loving a freak like me.”

Eridan sat in his seat quietly for a few moments, before taking a deep breath and saying, “Not true. I like you. A lot.”

“Do you now?” Vriska questioned, looking up at him with wide eyes. “Or is this another dumb attempt at flirting with me?”

“This isn't an attempt to do anythin' but make you realize that you've been wrong. All this time I've been tryin' to get you to notice me likin' you, and it hasn't worked. All those times I've just happened to grab your hand. That time I smacked your ass at your house. Even the time I called you pretty in front of Fef. All of that was me tryin' to get you to notice, and you never did.” He took another deep breath and looked down at her, with her wide eyes and slightly opened mouth. “And right now, I bet you're makin' fun of me in your mind because of this.”

She froze, because he was right: she was thinking about how big of a fool he was for having this outburst while on the job. “I'm sorry, Eridan. I didn't think you liked me. Not at all. In fact, I figured you hated me...”

“How could I hate someone like you? You're smart, you went places in your life, you have a talent that I could only ever dream of havin', and, most of all, you're the prettiest fuckin' person I know. And I love it. I really love it.” He jumped down and stuck his feet in the water, right next to her. “I can't believe you never noticed before.”

“I noticed, but I thought I was crazy. And then Tavros told me that he heard you saying how weird I was, and that you would never be more than my friend...I didn't think he'd lie to me.” Pressing her head up against his leg, Vriska let out a long sigh. “Thanks for liking me, Eridan. It means a lot.”

He stuck his hand out for her to grab, and she did, lacing her fingers between his. “It means a lot to me too, especially if you, uh, maybe like me back.”

“Like you back? Of course. I'm not gonna lie here, but I've been waiting for you to admit you like me, because guys have to make the first move. I might dominate most things, but not a romantic relationship, no way.” Her hand squeezed his tightly. “So go on, make the first move, will you?”

Opening his mouth to say what he had been waiting to say for a long time, Eridan realized how silly it would be for him to do it while he was working. “Wait until later. I'll take you out to dinner, and we'll do it then.” When she asked why, exactly, they had to wait, he replied, “I think there's something going on that involves us that we need to settle.”

And so, after choosing that fateful diner as the place for the meal, Eridan asked Vriska out with only the most tender of words, and she gleefully accepted. That, of course, was something that was bound to happen, and when Jade overheard the tiniest of snippets of their conversation, she turned to her three love interests with a smirk on her face. “All right,” she said, looking between them, “which one of you is responsible for that?” To her surprise, they shook their heads and said it had nothing to do with any of them. “None of you, huh? So I guess I date no one. Cool.”

“You should date me.” Feferi grinned at the black-haired woman, who rolled her eyes. “After all, I'm Eridan's best friend. I probably convinced him somewhere along the line to get chummy with Vriska, and now they're together, so it's got to be my fault.”

“No, date me. I've been your other half since before we could walk.” John pushed Feferi to the side and gave an even bigger grin at Jade. “And I know your feelings for me have always been stronger than your feelings for anyone else here, so why deny them any longer?”

“Date one of those two,” Tavros told her after a couple minutes of thinking, “because, even though I might be Vriska's best friend and I might have told her that no one liked her romantically when we all knew Eridan did, they've got better arguments than me, and therefore they should be top priority.”

Jade was going to follow his word and pick between Feferi and John, but something in what he said made her think for a moment. “Wait, did you just say you lied to Vriska?”

“Yeah, because I knew it would make her sad and want someone to love her, even though someone already did...”

“Sorry, bitches, but I'm picking him.” Disregarding the complaints from her jilted lovers, Jade put herself virtually on Tavros' lap. “Hey there, sweetie. Looks like you'll be dating me from now on. As your first job as my new boyfriend, I demand that you be happy about this. After all, this is what you've wanted, right?”

He nodded and smiled. “Sure is. I've always wanted the most beautiful girl in town to call me hers.”

“What a compliment! I think I've made the right choice here!” From over where they were sitting, Eridan and Vriska laughed at the over-the-top display of affection that Jade was putting on Tavros, but they never once let go of the other's hand while they did so.

* * *

It had seemed like a good idea to send her friends back at her other home some pictures of her and the love of her life, but when Vriska came home to a package on her doorstep, she was honestly a bit shocked. “Looks like your friends decided they were gonna send you somethin' back,” Eridan said with a smile, opening her door for her while she tried to get into the package.

“I didn't think they would! It's crazy to even think that people I haven't seen in like a year would even remember who I am.” Saying that made her laugh for an unknown reason to Eridan, and when he asked about it, she explained: “One of my friends, well, he got hit in the head with a weight and couldn't remember his wife. Actually, I still think he can't. Who knows. Maybe something in here will answer that for me.”

She got her answer when she saw the first picture, one of a group standing in front of a familiar glass wall—the entrance to the gym that held so many memories. “The tall, dark guy there. That's him. Equius. Yeah, good times with him. And the blonde guy there, that's Dave. He'd run on the track all the time, and then he'd come inside and flirt with that lady right there, the one looking away from the camera. She's Terezi. She's blind, but she's really cool.” Vriska smiled at some memories of her old friend. “I wonder where Aradia is...”

“Who's that?” Eridan asked, while Vriska flipped the picture over to read what was written on the back. “Is she another friend?”

“She's married to Equius. Let me find a picture of her. They're such a strange--” She left her sentence incomplete and punctuated it with a scream. “--let me read this to you! 'You're probably wondering where Aradia is, knowing you, and let me say that she was very insistent on taking this picture instead of being in it, claiming that you wouldn't want to see her. However, I know this isn't the case, and so I had to take a separate picture of her for you.' That guy, knowing that I'd want to see all my friends. He's so thoughtful.”

With his girlfriend being happy and talking to herself about her old friends, Eridan took the time to look around where they were in her house. This was the main room, he knew, but it was set up like a dress shop, because that's what it was. The mannequins were bare, but there were stacks of finished dresses on tables, as well as unfinished ones laying out with lace and silk all over them. Even though she sounded happy talking about her past life working at that gym, he knew that she was happier here doing this, especially with him by her side.

His thoughts were interrupted by another scream, followed by her shoving a picture in his face. “Here! This is Aradia right here!” she squealed, before panting a bit. “This is too exciting! All my friends are so grown up, being married and having kids and stuff. Makes me feel like I'm a bit behind in the times.” He took the picture and looked at it for a few seconds, but because the woman in it meant nothing to him, he handed it back without a word. “Don't get me wrong, I love where we are in our relationship, but I'm jealous of my friends...”

“If you want to get married and start poppin' out kids, fine by me. You're just doin' all the work.” At his comment, she dropped the package and all the pictures, before pushing him backwards into the only chair in the room. “Whoa, hey, not in here. If we're gonna do that, wait until we're in a bedroom.” The sound of Vriska's laughter in response sounded so very sweet to his ears.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You may ask, why is this fic that seems like it stands alone part of this story? And I will answer, because Vriska becomes important once more in this fic universe, playing off of her short appearance in the previous one. And also her story is interesting and worth sharing.


	5. The Making Of Non-Apocalyptic Memories

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's the "end of the world" and who knows what will happen outside when everyone thinks there's no tomorrow. What a perfect day to decide to break routine.

The holidays were supposed to be a time for family and friends, and definitely not the time for the world's supposed ending. But instead of media outlets reminding everyone to treasure the time with the people they care about most, it was all buzz about how the Mayans had predicted for the world to end on December twenty-first, and it was starting to annoy the people who actually did care about the holiday season.

A group of those such people had gathered to celebrate the Christmas holiday, and with every day that crept closer and closer to the doomsday that had been so highly touted, they grew more worried about their lives ending at the hands of crazed people instead of some otherworldly destruction. “I vote we should just stay here all day tomorrow,” a concerned Ariel Megido told the other members of the group that were at her daughter's house, “because who knows what kinds of insane things the people out there will be doing, and the last thing anyone needs is to lose a loved one this close to Christmas.”

“I agree with you completely, mom,” Aradia said in response, looking down at the extremely bundled up child that she held in her arms. “I would hate for one of us to leave and get killed and then—I couldn't even imagine someone having to explain to Harrison here what happened to...” Her voice trailed off as she brought her son close to her chest. “I'm not leaving this house tomorrow. Not for anything.”

“Tomorrow's Friday. I have to go to the gym on Friday. I pay for that ability, and I am not going to let my routine be ruined because of some silly Mayan prophecies or whatever.” Equius, completely ignoring the points that both his wife and mother-in-law had said, smiled as he looked around at everyone. “Besides, nothing bad will happen. It's just another day.”

“Just another day? I said I'd be going down to the gym with you to visit everyone at least once while I'm here, but I wouldn't set foot in there tomorrow.” Even though her back was turned to the group as she sat with her laptop on a windowsill, everyone who even slightly knew Vriska knew she was rolling her eyes at the insanity coming from Equius. “People are going to be shooting up everywhere. Poisoning food. Pouring bleach into swimming pools. You don't want to tempt fate by going out there, do you?”

He scoffed at her examples. “I trust the people of this city that they'll be on their best behavior tomorrow. And even if they aren't, nothing bad will happen to me just because I'm at the gym. The bad things always happen to people you don't know.”

“Equius, please, for me, don't go out tomorrow. Just call Dave and tell him that you can't do it, that you're putting family first and your creepy workout obsession second. He'll understand, I know he will.” Aradia leaned up against him, just to put Harrison down in his arms. “And if you won't do this for me, do it for your child. He needs his big and strong daddy around to take care of him.”

“You are being ridiculous, Aradia. Nothing will happen to me tomorrow simply because of what day it is. I am not canceling my plans, and nothing you say can make me change my mind.” He gently kissed the top of her head. “But I will come home early, not because of your worries, but because Nepeta should be arriving at some point tomorrow evening, and I would like to be here when she comes.”

Aradia looked over at her mom, who shrugged and sighed, while Vriska snorted where she sat. “I love how you're putting friends before family. But whatever floats your boat. I'm chalking this up to you being somewhat mentally fucked up from when that weight dropped on your head.”

“I don't appreciate your language, Vriska. As long as you are in the house I pay for, you are to speak appropriately, and not chastise me for my decisions about my life.” He rose to his feet, taking with him the seemingly asleep child, which made Aradia jump up. “It's gotten late, and I am going to lay him down and then get some rest for myself. Tomorrow is just an ordinary day, and I hope all of you ladies remember that.”

“Yes, we'll remember that!” Aradia told him, speaking over Vriska's sarcastic and snappish remark that Equius would have not appreciated at all. “Give me back Harrison before you go, though!” She grabbed at the baby, before he was handed back over. “Thank you. He's got to get kisses from his mommy before he gets put to bed. It's how I do it every night, and tonight will be no different.”

“Of course, my dear. Don't wait too long to lay him down, though. If you do, he'll be up in no time and neither of us will be getting any sleep tonight.” Equius then respectfully said good night to both of the guests who were present, and made his way up the stairs, only calling down them to remind Aradia that she really couldn't be downstairs too much longer.

Her response to that was to collapse back into her original seat. “Can I trade him in for the memory-deficient version? I'm tired of being ignored by him, and being ordered around, and being treated like all I've ever done for him is mother his child that he doesn't really remember conceiving. It's stupid.”

Closing her laptop and joining her friend, Vriska laughed. “That's what you get for being with him. I warned you, back when you and him first got together, he's a possessive and controlling motherfucker. His way or the highway.” She laughed more, and Aradia once again looked at her mom, this time with some result.

“I know that we want him to listen to you, darling, but maybe him going out and seeing the chaos firsthand will make him realize that we were right, and that his family is more important. If he grasps that concept, he should start to be more accepting of what you say.” The elder woman finished her statement when stomping around upstairs could be heard, followed with a loud asking as to where the others who should be up there were. “Sounds like you should get going, Aradia dear. We'll still be here in the morning, and we can deal with this more then.”

“Thanks, mom. At least one of us has a functional parent who can be of some use.” After telling her friend and mom good night several times, Aradia, carrying the still-sleeping Harrison in her arms, ascended the stairs and entered the bedroom where many memories, both good and bad, had been made. Equius was standing in the doorway, draped in a blanket that Aradia knew was hiding the fact that he was completely nude underneath it, and when she got to him he looked at her disapprovingly. “Sorry. The guests kept me down there a bit longer than I intended.”

“He gets put in his crib every night at the same time. He'll be three minutes late tonight. If it so much as messes with his sleep schedule even a bit, I refuse to get up and deal with him.” The berating continued as Aradia went through the nightly motions of laying Harrison down, of making sure that everything they would need to take care of him overnight was nearby, of getting undressed and changed into her nightclothes, and, finally, of laying on her side of the bed, with absolutely nothing on her body touching him. “Good night, my love. Tomorrow will be fine, I promise,” he said, before he turned off the lights and promptly fell asleep, leaving Aradia to ponder why, exactly, she was still putting up with the repetition and routine of being with him.

As much as she wanted the next day to be just a normal day, a tiny part of her wished the end of the world really was upon them. And that tiny part nearly got what it wanted.

* * *

Much like he did every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, Equius met up with Dave outside of the gym to take part in several hours of relatively easy working out. Compared to most Fridays, that one in particular was a lot less busy, with only the most dedicated of people there. “Do you think people are staying in because the world's supposed to end?” the blond asked while they stood at the side of the track, waiting for a few people to leave. “Or do you think it's the holidays that are keeping them away?”

“In years past, the holidays have been busier than normal, so this might be due to that stupid world-ending prophecy. I don't believe a word of it. No one is going to do anything today, and we are certainly not going to die.” Equius nodded as if agreeing with his own words, before watching the people who were in the way notice them and get off the track. “But enough about that. The track's open, so let's get to—“

The shrill ringing of a phone cut him off, and he turned to see the receptionist standing behind them, holding out a bag that Equius recognized as his own. “Your phone has been ringing for ten minutes now, Zahhak,” the man said, the lisp that normally punctuated his voice as sharp as ever. “If you don't take care of it right now, I might just have to void your gym membership or something. You know the rules. Phones are to be on silent when in bags.”

“Yes, but, no one ever calls me. Anyone who would call knows the rules just as I do, and they also know to call at times that I have approved, to allow my schedule to remain as normal.” After apologizing profusely and taking the bag. Equius found himself looking at his phone and seeing many missed calls from the same two numbers.

“Who's calling you? Aradia? She scared that you're gonna die?” Dave playfully asked, nudging his friend in the side. “Come on, say it is. I want to laugh at her being paranoid.”

Neither of the numbers that were calling Equius belonged to Aradia, nor did they belong to anyone who was currently at his house, but something inside of him didn't want Dave knowing that. “Uh, yes, it is indeed Aradia calling me. I'm going to assume something bad has happened at home, and her, in her paranoia, won't leave to fix it. I'm afraid,” he swallowed hard, because not only was this a lie that he was telling to his very close friend, but it was also something that was going to break his routine, “I must go. She needs me at home. We can return to our running at a later date.”

“Whatever you say. I'll just continue on without you, and you will be missed.” He gave Equius a manly bro-hug then, before adding, “Give the kiddo a hug for me when you get home. He's too little to understand why, but it's the thought that counts.”

“Will do. See you Sunday for our regular workout.” Equius bid his friend farewell then and went to his vehicle as fast as he could, getting inside and sitting there, staring at his phone. He had to call someone back, but which one? One number was Nepeta's, and she was his absolute best friend, but she hadn't called in nearly an hour. The other number belonged to her boyfriend Karkat, and he seemed to be the one making more calls. Deciding that he was the person to call, he went to press the redial button, but froze. Making that call could potentially have consequences that would change the course of the day, and Equius really did not like it when his day was changed more than a little bit. Routine was best, but...

The phone rang once more in his hands before he could argue with himself if it was okay to make a call, and it was Karkat who was calling. He answered it without any hesitation, because this was being thrust upon him, and was not any decision of his own. “Have you heard from Nepeta at all?” the rough voice on the other end asked. “She's been gone for over an hour, and I'm starting to get worried.”

“Why would I have heard from her? I am not with her, and since I don't live remotely near her, it's foolish to think that I would know where she is. Besides, shouldn't you two be on your way here now? Why are you not in the car together?”

“She decided that she should be the one to go back into the town that's a mile back up the road when our car ran out of fuel.” Karkat let out a long sigh, which was not normal for the usually intense man. “She said, 'oh, I'm faster, I'll go get enough to get us back to the town and then we'll be golden' and she fucking left before I could tell her not to go. And she hasn't answered her phone or anything, and I wondered if maybe she called you to ask if you could come get us or something, but apparently she hasn't. Great.”

Equius thought for a second about how he should react, asking himself if he should go into the situation without concern about anyone other than his friend, or if he should take things slowly and confer with the people at home before he did anything. Hearing Karkat start to cry a little on the other end of the phone answered that question. “I'd assume you're somewhere between here and your town, right? I'll drive that way and see if I can help you guys out. I haven't heard anything from Nepeta, but she did call my phone an hour ago, but left no message. You keep trying to contact her, and I'll be there soon enough.”

“What, really? Thanks. I'll be sitting in the green car with the obnoxious blue cat tail and ears on it, and you should see it once you're almost to the next town over.” He said a few more things that Equius was unable to pick up, but finished the call with “I really hope we can find Nepeta and get back to your house safe and sound.” The dark-haired man, sitting with his phone against his ear and his mind racing about what to do hoped so too, but he wasn't sure if it was in his best interests to follow through with what he said.

If he didn't, he'd be leaving his friend out missing and her lover sitting in a car waiting for help that would never arrive, but he would be in good standing with Aradia and the others that were at his house. If he did, then Nepeta and Karkat both would be safe, but he would be in some hot water with Aradia—because there was no way he could tell her he was going. Telling her would be a bad idea, since she was so worried about the world ending and him being out longer was just more of a chance for him to die.

But he wouldn't die, and saving his friend from whatever cruel fate she had met was more important than his wife being mad at him for one night. He put his phone down on the passenger side seat and started up his truck, getting out of the gym parking lot and, soon, the city, as fast as he could. There were things he needed to do, and sitting around wasting time was not one of them.

Aradia knew this as well, but she thought that he was coming home to be with her, as he had specifically said many times that he would be home at a certain time, and that time had passed at about the same time that Equius was driving the exact opposite way. “Calm down,” her mother told her, giving a reassuring smile. “He's probably just distracted by something. You know how men are. They see something they want and they go after it.”

“But mom, that can't be it. Equius isn't like that. He's always following his stupid schedules and routines and he never does anything that he hasn't accounted for. I'm worried. What if he got into another accident? Worse, what if he's dead? I didn't want him going anywhere today, and this is why!” She let out an exasperated scream, causing Vriska, whose back was turned to the brunette, to look around in shock. “He better be walking through that door within the next five minutes, or else I am going to start calling him until I get an answer.”

“Whoa. Calm the fuck down, Aradia. He's a grown-ass man, he's allowed to have a little bit of freedom every once in a while.” The laugh Vriska used to punctuate her statement ticked Aradia off even more than she already was, made apparent by the shoe thrown in her direction. “Okay, whatever. Keep him on the same leash he keeps you on. Cool.”

This earned the other shoe being thrown, hitting the wall in the same spot the first one did. “I'm not keeping anyone on any leash! He's always doing what he tells me he will, and this is not doing what he said he would!” Letting out another scream, Aradia was replied to by a wailing from the upstairs bedroom, making her tug at her hair in anger before storming up the stairs, but not before telling her mom and friend: “He's got five minutes, I swear. After that I'm calling him and calling him and getting him back as soon as I can so I can give him a piece of my mind.”

Five minutes quickly passed, as did ten and fifteen. By the time Aradia got around to starting her calls, it was almost a half hour later, and she was unable to get even the slightest response with all of the calls she made. This was because Equius was a firm believer in following the rules of no phones while driving, and he was going as fast as he legally could to rescue Nepeta and Karkat, so there was no time to answer the calls. It hurt him to know that Aradia was calling to see where he was, because she rarely (if ever) had to do that. She normally knew exactly where he was and how long he was going to be there. This was the first time in a long time that he had gone off on his own without any warning, and having to ignore her calls to protect his location was tearing at his soul.

By the time he caught a glimpse of the green car, he had heard his phone ring nearly seventy times, and he had no intentions of even answering it. There were bigger, more life-threatening things to deal with, like getting Karkat from that silly car and driving him into the town that was just a mile up the road, looking for any traces of Nepeta the whole way. “You really showed up,” he remarked once he climbed into the big truck and they started driving away. “I thought you'd have stayed away, done gym-related things.”

“Nepeta means more to me than working out ever could.” As Equius said that, his phone began ringing once more, earning him a question from Karkat as to why he wasn't answering his phone when it was lit up with a picture of Aradia's smiling face. “Oh, because she doesn't know I've come to do this. She's bound to be mad.”

“I applaud you, dude. Not telling your wife that you're leaving town to do something? That takes guts, especially from you, mister 'I tell people every time I breathe.' What's gotten into you?”

He ignored the insult, instead focusing on the end question. “It's called devotion to a friend, and I'm sure that Aradia will understand why I did this once I return home with you and her both in tow.” The truck stopped in front of what seemed to be the only place in the town that Nepeta could have gone: a gas station that seemed to be run out of a house. “Now come along, we need to find her before something bad happens.”

Not even two seconds later, gunshots rang out, coming from inside of the house they were just about to enter. “Holy shit!” Karkat screamed, jumping back in his seat. “We're going to go in there? There's got to be some lunatics in there that will kill us!”

“The world's ending today, don't you know? We've got to risk our lives to save the girl before we all die.” Lies, total lies, but by speaking of the thing that Aradia feared so much, Equius made himself feel a bit more comfortable with the situation. He wasn't just going against his word by breaking his schedule, he was going against hers by putting himself right in the path of danger.

And as he got out of the truck and started toward the house's front door, he couldn't have been more ready to embrace death for the sake of his friend.

* * *

“So you're holding me hostage in here _why_ , again?” Sarcasm dripping from her voice, Nepeta looked at the armed man standing in front of her and sighed when he just shrugged. “You guys are absolutely terrible, you know? You ransack some dude's house just because it happens to be part of the only gas station in the town, you kill the guy running the register, and you take me, an innocent bystander, hostage for some strange reason! Shouldn't you have, oh, I don't know, killed all witnesses?”

The gunman shrugged again, before saying, “We were told to kill anyone who would stop us from getting what we wanted. You wouldn't do that, since you seemed to just want to leave, so we decided to keep you safe while we do our business.”

“I am an eyewitness to your crime! I'm going to call the cops the second I get the chance, because you guys are robbers and murderers and...what is wrong with you people?”

“I could shoot you right now and put an end to your squealing.” He pointed his gun at Nepeta and she backed away, choosing to sit on the chair that was against the wall instead of standing so close to the man. “But we've got too much innocent blood on our hands already. Don't need another fatality tonight.”

Her eyes lit up at his last sentence. “Does that mean I get to leave?”

“No.” The man moved so that he was completely blocking the doorway. “You're staying here until the bossman downstairs gets done robbin' the place. Shouldn't be too much longer, princess, so just keep your dainty little ass in that chair and we'll be golden.”

“Dainty? Do you know who you're talking to?” She knew she shouldn't laugh at the guy, especially since he did have a loaded gun in his hands, but it was hard to resist. “I'm anything but dainty. You couldn't have picked a worse person to hold hostage.”

The man looked her over, his eyes settling on the cat-eared hood that was on her head. “Says the woman who looks like she's wearing a teenager's hoodie. You can't convince me you're anything but a precious little flower.”

“Can you run a mile in seven minutes? Can you even complete a marathon? Oh, and what about weightlifting? I could probably lift you pretty high.” She laughed some more, as the man became flustered at trying to answer her questions. “Next time you hold someone hostage, make sure she's not someone who's actually able to fight back a little.”

“You can't fight a gun, miss, and I don't care if I'm not supposed to hurt you. You just made me feel like a fool, and I can't let you live after that.” He aimed the gun at her and pulled the trigger, but due to him shaking in anger at his embarrassment, he missed completely, shooting out the window instead of hitting Nepeta at all. “What the—how did I miss?”

“Cat-like movements. I'm so fast, I moved where you were aiming without you realizing it.” Seeing that he was aiming at her once more, she put her hands up and added, “it was a joke. I don't know why you missed. But now people are gonna know something's up. There's a window missing that was there earlier.”

The gun was lowered and the guy groaned. “Right. Fuck. Now everyone's going to start getting the police on our tails.” As if by magic, the sound of sirens filled the room, as well as footsteps running up the stairs, across the hall, and into the room a second gunman, this one with a backpack full of most-likely stolen goods, came flying in. “Dude, I didn't mean to shoot the window. It was an accident.”

“Didn't I say don't hurt the woman?” Nepeta grinned at the second gunman, because she had terrorized him when he had originally brought her upstairs, telling her how much fun he was going to have with her, only for her to break it to him that she wasn't single, and she wasn't a force to be reckoned with. He had to leave the room and be replaced with the other guy because of how badly she had owned him. “Besides, it's not the window's fault. Some assholes have been sitting outside and they called the fuzz on us.”

“Is it the tall girly-looking guy and the short brownie? Those two were down there when I shot the cashier. They just pulled up, I think, and I shot, and now...” His voice trailed off as him and the second man looked to Nepeta, who jumped from her chair and bolted out of the room, recognizing the descriptions for who they belonged to. “Hey, wait, bitch! Get back here!” He lifted his gun and aimed to shoot, while the second guy started in pursuit. By the time Nepeta was at the stairs, he finally shot, hitting his accomplice instead of the target.

The police barged into the building right as Nepeta reached the ground floor, followed by a tumbling body that had been shot through the head by a man who was shocked and standing in the upstairs doorway. One of the cops saw that man and started up the stairs, while the other grabbed Nepeta and pulled her against the wall, handcuffing her as she screamed her innocence. Those screams carried their way outside, where Karkat and Equius were sitting on the front sidewalk of the building. “You don't think Nepeta shot those shots, do you?” Karkat mumbled, looking at Equius with worried eyes. “I'd hate for her to have been the one causing trouble...”

“I'm sure she was the one being shot at,” Equius replied with somewhat of a smile. “And she dodged each and every bullet like the flexible cat she is.”

While neither story was quite right, it was still several hours before the entire situation was resolved, with the gunman who hadn't been shot arrested, and the one who had taken to the hospital where he was pronounced dead some time later (this was heard on the radio while they were driving back to the city). And Nepeta, who truly was innocent, was set free, the police admiring her bravery when she told them her story of how she faced those bad guys and made them feel miserable because she was accomplished and they were just shooting up gas stations on the day of the end of the world for fun.

“Thanks for coming to get me from that,” she told Karkat and Equius once they were in the truck and on the way home. “If it wasn't for you two being all worried about me, I might have actually died in there. That would have been so terrible, dying right before the holidays...”

“Yeah, well, if you had died, and Equius hadn't come to get me, I probably would have died too, waiting for you to come back when you never would.” Karkat turned and looked back at the green car that was being towed behind the truck. “I can't believe of all the nights to have problems, it was that one. End of the world, for sure.”

The way Karkat said that made Equius sit up straight, before groaning. “I never did tell Aradia where I was going or what I was doing...she'll be worried sick if she hears about all the violence going on and hasn't heard a thing about me.” That was when the radio was turned on, and the fate of that second gunman was learned, preceded by and followed with many other accounts of violence in their city and the surrounding towns. “Oh dear. She's going to be furious that I'm getting home late without any warning at all.”

“You saved your best friend!” Nepeta nuzzled her face against his shoulder, as she couldn't do much else while squished between the two guys. “That's the best reason ever for being out late, and if she doesn't understand it, then she's just a terrible wife!”

“She's not terrible, she's just grown used to me and my punctuality. Please refrain from speaking badly of her around me, because even though I know I am too hard on her because I like things being kept on schedule, it doesn't mean you can be hard on her for her trying to adhere to my standards.” His eyes drifted to the clock. It was after midnight, and they were just getting to the city limits. She wouldn't even be awake when they got home, meaning he'd be on the floor for the night because everywhere else would be taken. “Why do I have to be so uptight about that sort of thing? It is really going to come and bite me now.”

“It's what makes you you!” the woman said with a grin and a bit of a purr. “Ever since I met you, you have been big on two things: not cursing, and following schedules. You like knowing what you'll be doing at what time, and if it's not perfect, it makes you uncomfortable. This little trip to save me, you know what this is? This is the first time I've seen you break your schedule for a reason that isn't related to your head injury.”

He gave a small nod as he realized how right Nepeta was. “So maybe, just maybe, Aradia will be awake when we get to my house, and maybe I can smooth things over with her and everything will be okay. After all, it's not like the world actually ended or anything.”

* * *

The sound of moans and springs creaking was what greeted the three when Equius opened the front door to his house. As he had grown used to Aradia's mom being in the guest room, it was a shocking surprise to him, but what was even more shocking that, instead of there being someone asleep on the air mattress in the living room as there should have been, the room was empty aside from Aradia, who was glaring in their direction. “Oh, it seems you've come back alive. Great.”

“Sorry about this. They needed my help and—“ She raised a hand to silence him, and he shut his mouth accordingly. Nepeta and Karkat stepped away from the two, choosing to just walk down the hall into the sitting room where they were to be sleeping, without saying so much as a word to their hosts.

“You couldn't bother telling me that they needed help? I've been sitting here worried out of my mind. You knew I wasn't okay with you going anywhere, and yet you did and you went places I didn't even know about! You could have died!” She stood up, opened her arms wide as she approached him, and grabbed him into a big hug. “You could have died...”

He hugged her back, resting his chin on the top of her head. “It would have taken a lot more than two incompetent robbers to kill me.” She gasped in shock, before asking why, exactly, he was even in the vicinity of robbers. “Well you see, I got a call from Karkat asking for help, and we ended up calling the cops on these guys robbing a gas station that happened to have Nepeta in it. We didn't even come in contact with these bad guys. It was all her.”

“And she came out of it fine?”

“Of course, she's the strongest woman I know. Oh, sorry, second strongest. I'm sorry to have put you through that. I should have warned you I was going. I know you had to have been worried sick about where I was.”

“I sure was worried! Mom decided she was going to go home, because not only did your dad call and say he was coming over tomorrow, well, today, bright and early, but Vriska ended up having to go to the airport to pick up her boyfriend.” She rolled her eyes, even though Equius wasn't able to see it. “So that's why there's that noise going on.”

He snorted, before jokingly asking, “Don't they know that it's not the twenty-first anymore? The world didn't end. They don't need to be doing that like they're about to die. Now we're going to be subjected to not only them talking about how great that is, but we'll have my father around, telling us all cow jokes.”

“He tried to tell me one when he called, actually. Asked what it's like being like the majestic cow or whatever. I wanted to hang up on him.” Breaking from the hug, Aradia grabbed Equius's hand and started to lead him towards the stairs. “And, whatever we do, we are not letting him get anywhere near our precious baby, because he told me that he's going to bring some fresh milk along and I don't think he understands that babies, especially ones as young as Harrison, shouldn't be drinking cow milk.”

“They're not? Oh...that would have been nice to have been told before right now.”

“I'd scold you for making that mistake, but that thinking seems to run in your family. Now come on, let's get upstairs before he starts crying, since it is just about feeding time. And he's been missing his daddy something awful.” They were at the stairs when whimpers were heard over the sound of the springs creaking. “See, told you. But he's so used to schedules being followed that he couldn't appreciate the end of the world and you being gone.” She paused for a second, before looking at him and smiling. “I could, though. It was nice not having you telling me when to do things for once.”

Equius smiled back at her, even laughing a tiny bit. “It was, wasn't it? Well we'll try to keep my scheduling down a bit from now on, but right now we've got to worry about our son, not anything related to how we'll live our lives.”

It was right then, going up the stairs, that Aradia realized how glad she was that the world didn't actually end, and that she got to express her feelings about everything. And it was then that Equius realized just how much this woman meant to him, which was much, much more than his constant planning and scheduling did. Once they got to their room, with the sounds of whining and squeaking around them, they fell into a deep and passionate kiss, one only broken when the whines became cries, and they had to break apart.

“I love you,” they both said at the same moment, causing them both to giggle. It was like they had just fallen in love all over again, for the very first time, even though it was far from the first time and they had never actually fallen out of love.

It was a very good thing that the world was still turning.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To show how long I've had these fics posted on my Tumblr but not on here, this was published to Tumblr on 12/21/12. A year and a half later, almost, and here it is, going up on AO3.


	6. The (un)Growth of Aradia and Equius' Relationship

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Six months or so after the birth of her son, Aradia's still carrying around baby weight and Equius hates it. What he inspires in her because of it has the potential to wreck their romance.

One of the few things that had been nice about Equius losing his memory was that he didn't remember how obsessive he used to be about eating healthy. Before his accident, and once he started getting his memories back, he was always for eating only the finest vegetables and fruits and meats, and staying away from anything that was less than natural. That meant no sweets, no snacks, and most of all, no homemade comfort foods. Since Aradia had always been a bit of a curvy woman (not too terribly much, but she did have a few curves when they met that were not simply her body structure), she had been forced to adapt to Equius' eating habits—but when he couldn't remember a thing about the person he was, she used that to her advantage.

Even after he was mostly back to himself, she'd take control of the menu on days where he was thinking like he would when younger, to the point that she was able to use what he'd do on those days to influence his decisions on the days where he knew what was going on. That meant that, instead of the healthy meals that Equius always wanted them to eat, they were eating things that were fatty and probably leading them to their deaths a little quicker. It also meant that, thanks to knowing how to manipulate him, Aradia was able to play off having all sorts of candies and sweets in the house while she was pregnant, simply because she could claim that she had been having cravings for those particular things on days when he was out of his mind.

This led to, after having given birth to their quite large son, her being much pudgier than she would have liked to have been, with even more accentuated curves than she had before. And because she was married to a now-completely cured of his mental problems man who was always going to the gym, she was expected to do something about the extra weight she now had.

“I can't do anything about it,” she protested, just days after she had their son, “not for a long while. Leave me alone about it until Harrison's a bit older, okay?”

“If you wait too long, you're not going to do anything at all, and I am not going to let my beautiful wife sit around being bigger than she needs to be.” The way he approached the topic was with disgust, but it was because he knew that he was to blame for almost all of it, even if it was her manipulation that caused some of the problems. “But I am aware that you have to wait a few weeks before you start on a workout schedule that will get you back to your previous shape, so we will do just that.”

She ended up waiting more than just a few weeks, if only because she would always come up with excuses that he would buy. “I can't separate myself from him, not now,” she whined after six weeks. “He's too little to be given to someone who isn't me for even an hour or two. I'll tell you when I'm ready, I swear.” But she never quite got around to telling him. The holidays came and went, and with them came the visits from people who both gushed over how cute the little boy was and commented about how different she looked because of him. Although she didn't think she was even that much bigger than her normal state, she earned a couple snide remarks from Vriska, who personally knew a thing or two about weight problems, and some cow jokes from Equius' dad Aurthour, all of which were hurtful.

By the time spring came around, Aradia was ready to finally do something about how she looked, if only because she was annoyed with all the attention her body was getting from everyone. “Sweetie, you don't have to let them get to you,” her mom said to her while they sat together at the elder woman's house, little Harrison laying on the couch asleep between them. “You're a strong and intelligent person; you don't have to listen to a single word they say about how you look.”

“It's not that easy, mom! I've got Equius chiding me about needing to go with him to work out. I get messages from Vriska about the path she thinks I'm going down, and about how she wants to use me as a model for her dresses but she isn't making them plus sized so I can fit into them! And then there's Aurthour...he's getting on my last nerve with his comments about how I remind him of his cow.” Aradia blinked back tears as her mom held her hand comfortingly. “I am not a cow! I'm nothing even close to a cow!”

“Aradia, my dear, you're just stressed out. A lot has happened in your life recently, and it's made you more susceptible to these hurtful things. Just ignore them, it'll all get better.” Normally, when Ariel Megido spoke, she was saying the truth, but Aradia just couldn't find it inside herself to believe her mom's words. She promptly burst out crying, waking the sleeping child up and causing him to cry too. Like any good mother and grandmother would, Ariel grabbed both of them and held them as tightly as she could. “Calm down, it's all going to be okay. Things will get better, I swear they will. They always have, haven't they?”

The words were able to get through to Aradia, but not so much to Harrison, who was just a baby and couldn't understand what his grandma was saying to him. “They have, but those things have always been different...”

“True, but I'd think it would be easier to get back into shape than it would be to, say, redevelop a memory or the trust lost when someone just disappears on you for a few hours without so much as a warning.”

“Mom, you're right. I can easily just start going to the gym with Equius and make him happy, and get everyone off my case. After all, I did stick by him when he didn't remember me, so this shouldn't be too hard.” Thanking her mother for her kindness, she then took the crying baby and planted several kisses on his forehead, which calmed him. “But what about him? If we're there, he's got to be somewhere that isn't with us.”

Ariel smiled, the corners of her eyes and mouth crinkling as she did. “What kind of grandmother would I be if I didn't offer to watch my little grandson while his parents are off bonding?”

“Not a bad one, but I wouldn't like it very much. Thanks for being so amazing, mom. I really love having you being the parent that lives nearby, instead of Aurthour. He's just so abusive and mean to me...before I got pregnant, he was super nice to me, but once he knew, it was like I was his favorite target for his mean jokes.”

“That's because he's a bit of a strange man, living alone with animals while his sons are off being productive in society.” Ariel gave a small sigh, resting her head on her daughter's shoulder. “He'd be a lot nicer to you if he'd come visit you more, I'm sure, but then I wouldn't visit because I cannot stand that man. How he was able to create Equius, I have no idea.”

Aradia began to cradle her son in her arms, slowly putting him back to sleep. “I ask myself that a lot, because I'm married to a complete gentleman for the most part, and then his dad's a jerk who makes cow jokes and lives on a farm with a cow and two horses.”

“We must be thankful for the woman who brought your husband into this world, then. It's a shame that neither of us got to meet her, but it's wonderful that she was able to turn her sons into decent humans in the time she had with them.” Aradia was going to ask how, exactly, her mom knew more about Equius' mom than she did, but she figured it was from all the unwanted time she had spent listening to Aurthour talk. “But, no matter. The point is, that man is a terrible creature and you shouldn't feel offended by what he says.”

“Except, you know, I am offended by it. And that's why I don't like him coming to visit, and I'm glad he thinks his cow is more important than his grandson.”

Her mom sighed contently, looking at the child in Aradia's arms. “He's a real cutie, dear, and Aurthour doesn't know what he missing by not wanting to see him. I'm glad you're going to trust me with him while you and Equius are doing what you feel you need to do.”

“I don't feel that I need to do this, though! I'm perfectly fine with who I am, but no one else is, and I just want them to stop bothering me!” The yelling made Harrison stir for a second, staring up at his mom with his deep blue eyes that were almost identical to his father's, before he went back to sleep with a little whine. “I'm sorry, mom, I didn't mean to start yelling at you.”

“I know you didn't, Aradia. Like I said before, you're just stressed out. Now why don't you go home before it gets any later? I know that you have to be there before Equius gets home from work, or else he'll be worried.” That was one thing about her mother that she really liked, that she knew about and understood some of the situation she was dealing with at home, which involved having to be in the house at a certain time every night, just because routines were very, very important. “Just give me a call whenever you're going to need me to babysit, and I will gladly do it. You mean the world to me, dearie, and I want you to be happy.”

“I want me to be happy too, mom...hopefully this working out thing will be able to do that for me.”

* * *

It didn't take long after he heard the plans for Equius to become extremely excited about getting to help his wife out in the one place he really loved being. “You are aware that the workout I am going to put you through will only have optimal results if you return to the diet I had us on prior to all of this,” he said to her, a large and bright smile on his face. “Which I would be more than glad to only have one meal cooking every night, instead of the two you have to make now.”

“I don't think I'm ready to return to rabbit food and red meat, not yet. Let's just keep the food as it is, and see what just working out does for me.” She absentmindedly played with her fingers a bit, trying to keep from making eye contact with him. “Besides, I've become a bit addicted to some of the sweets you've been buying me.”

“That stops once working out starts, Aradia. I am not going to spend my money on you getting sugary treats while you're trying to reverse the damage they've already done to you.” That was when she stopped playing with her fingers and glared at him, to which he looked a bit concerned. “What, did I say something you don't like? You know it's very true.”

Her glaring became more intense as she snapped back, “No, I know it's not. You're forgetting that my eating habits aren't the only thing that changed over the past year.”

“Please stop using the excuse of having a child. Your body didn't change that much because of carrying him, and we both know that.” His voice was cold and unfeeling, and it irritated her to the point of dropping the glare and rolling her eyes. “Aradia! That was very childish of you!”  
“Childish? You're the one who seems to have forgotten that one of the worst parts of being pregnant is the changes the body goes through! Sure, maybe my snacking wasn't helping matters, but I am completely positive that it's at least partly your fault that I look like this!” She caught him looking down from where she had assumed he was staring into her eyes, and it was as if she could feel him judging her body, with all its new curves and flaws that hadn't been there before. “Are you examining what you've done? I can show you more, if you'd like.”

Instead of taking that as the threat it was intended as, he had somewhat of a sly grin find its way to his face, saying, “Oh, sure, show me more. It's not every day anymore that I get the opportunity to see your body.”

“You want to see more? Okay, look at this!” Without really thinking about what she was doing, she pulled her shirt off from over her head, tossing it at him, and then she just sat on her chair fully dressed from the waist down, but only wearing an extremely ragged and several sizes too small bra on her top half. “Not so pretty, is it?”

He approached her, kneeled down in front of her, and let the grin turn into a genuine smile. “It might not be pretty, but it is you, and you're lovely. So maybe you're a lot bigger than I'd like you to be. It doesn't take away from the fact that you're the woman I chose to marry, and we will fix all this damage that those terrible foods did to you.”

“You're ignoring the fact that most of this is because of me having your son.”

“I'm not ignoring it, I'm choosing to not mention it. Pregnancy and childbirth are natural things; the snack foods you've chosen to eat are not, and therefore I'm going to place the blame on them.” His eyes rested on the lone piece of clothing on her chest, and chuckled. “Although, I'd be an idiot if I didn't blame all that milk you've needed to feed Harrison for the rather extreme change in your breast size.”

“Thanks for mentioning that. Thanks, also, for refusing to do anything to help with it.” Aradia positioned her arms so that they blocked most of her chest from his view. “It's pretty uncomfortable having to wear my old bras, when I'm obviously too big for them now.”

That smile turned back into the little grin, as he carefully moved her arms back to by her sides. “If you're not comfortable, why don't you just not wear them?”

“Because I'd rather not come out of this with saggy tits, thanks.” His eyebrows furrowed at her use of language he didn't like, but she didn't seem to care. “I really want to go back to the way I was before this. Curvy, but not too curvy. You liked me a lot like that.”

“I did like you like that, but I like you like this too, simply because this is still you. But I must admit, I do prefer the skinnier you a lot more. She's more confident in who she is.” He placed a finger on part of her collarbone and slowly traced it down her body, stopping once his finger landed on a few marks that ran all across her somewhat flabby stomach. “Skinnier you also didn't have this many stretch marks on her body. Didn't you use that special lotion I bought you to prevent these?”

She nodded, but even her affirmation didn't make him believe her. “I guess it didn't help out, because those are there and that bottle is half empty. It's okay though, they're kind of like scars to show what I've been through...”

“So much for having a bikini photoshoot whenever we go to visit Vriska and that boyfriend of hers. You wouldn't want to show these off to everyone, would you?”

“I'll try to do something about them. But before I even begin to worry about that, I'm going to get myself to the point that I'd feel comfortable _in_ a bikini.” Aradia took a deep breath, focusing on the goal of making herself look better to the point that no one harassed her about her size anymore, rather than any sort of clothing goals. If she got to a point that she was comfortable with herself and everyone else approved, that would be enough for her. But she knew that getting to that point would be difficult, especially when she was going to be led to it by someone as strict as Equius. “Uh, one question. When are we going to start this working out thing?”

There wasn't an answer given until Equius had stood back up and gone to look at the calendar that hung on the wall next to the phone. “Whenever you want, Aradia,” he replied, checking dates. “I have my normal routine of Monday, Wednesday, and Friday workouts, but if you want to go, say, tomorrow, that will be fine.”

“Tomorrow, huh? I guess we could do that. I'll call my mom in the morning to have her ready to watch Harrison once you get off work. Sound like a plan?” He grunted in approval, but it was nearly drowned out by the sound of frantic screaming coming from the upstairs bedroom. Aradia checked the time and saw that it was what they considered “normal” feeding time for Harrison, who, just like his father, ran on nearly perfect schedules. As she grabbed her shirt and started her way up the stairs, she could hear Equius coming up behind her, which became very obvious when she felt his hand touch her rear, squishing it a bit. “Hey! Don't do that!”

“How could I resist? It was beckoning me.” He pushed past her once they reached the top of the stairs, but not before giving her chest a quick squeeze. “Get yourself ready for him, I'll calm him down in the meantime.”

She would have done what he had said, but she caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror directly inside their bedroom, and couldn't help but stare. She could remember standing in front of this very mirror, looking at herself and being proud of who looked back. The long, red-haired Aradia with the smile and youthful face that once looked back was long gone, replaced first with the tired-looking brunette who tried to still look happy, then the even more tired and insecure version, who tried to hide her ever-expanding stomach from herself. And now there was the Aradia staring back at that very moment, six-plus months removed from having her son, still carrying all the weight from being pregnant plus some extra, with all sorts of insecurities and worries plastered on her incredibly tired face.

That had to change, she decided, giving her reflection a small smile. She wasn't going to be this version of herself anymore—not that she'd be able to be any of the past ones. She'd just make herself into a new her, a better her, a her that pleased everyone and herself and could be a good mom for her son and a great wife for Equius. Him asking her to please sit down on their bed broke her from her thinking, but before she went to the bed she tried to give herself a bigger smile, but couldn't muster it. Once she was seated exactly where she was supposed to be, she had Harrison placed in her arms and he was staring at her with those blue eyes and a toothless smile on his face, although it was just for a second, because no sooner than Equius removed his hands from the boy did he start bawling again.

“What a spoiled child,” Equius remarked, sitting down right next to Aradia as she situated the child so he could eat. “I think we're coddling him a bit too much.”

“That's what we get for making him adjust to routines, I think. We'll just have to deal with him being like this.” His behavior may have been one thing they couldn't change, but they could change other things...like who Aradia saw in the mirror.

* * *

“So you're the woman I'm supposed to whip into shape,” the man from behind the reception counter said, his voice heavy with a lisp, as Aradia awkwardly stood in front of him. “When I was asked to take someone and train them, I didn't think it was going to be you. I was thinking illicit lover, or someone he worked with, not his wife. Definitely not his wife.”

She looked down at the ground, trying to avoid looking at her body in any way. She didn't know where Equius had run off to, but chances were very high that he was off doing something with Dave or one of his other friends that frequented the gym, and she rather needed him. Just with those few sentences, she already didn't like the guy who had apparently been appointed her trainer, and she didn't want to be stuck with him.

“What's your problem? You don't like how you look? Well it's good that I know a thing or two about making a woman look her greatest.” He snorted, before getting from behind the desk by climbing over it. “Hopefully there aren't any injuries while I'm training you today. I'd hate for someone to, say, get hit in the head with a weight.”

“That's not a funny joke.”

“Wasn't supposed to be. It's a serious matter that needs to be dealt with a lot more than it is.” Finally, after one terrible joke and making Aradia feel uncomfortable, the man introduced himself. “I'm sure you've heard about me from someone, but my name's Sollux. I don't normally do training, but, like I said, I was asked. My place normally is at the reception desk.”

Aradia couldn't help but laugh at the way Sollux sighed at the last thing he said. “You don't seem like the type of person to work in a gym,” she commented, looking up at him and noticing the braces on his teeth (most likely the cause for his lisp, she realized) and the two different colors of his eyes. “You look like you belong behind a computer in an office somewhere.”

“I may look the part of a nerd, but I assure you, I'm strong. Before she left for wherever it is she went, the chick Vriska that I replaced challenged me to a competition to test strength and endurance and all that. I smoked her. Best initiation to a new job ever.”

“That seems like something Vriska would do...” It was the honest truth, thanks to all the memories she had of spending time in the gym with the blond woman long before she moved. “She worked here when I first moved into town. Actually, she's the reason I ever met Equius, because she was feeling lazy or something and made me go to him when I needed help.”

“Damn, how long ago was that?”

She shrugged. “Not too long. Nine years, maybe? I've lost count, especially with all the things that happened over the past couple years...”

“Okay, I think I've figured you out. You've been to this gym before, but it's been years and years, and you're not even used to my methods. You were raised on Vriska's sissy training. Got it.” Sollux gave a double thumbs-up and laughed. “I was actually waiting for the day to see you in here for some working out. I remember you coming to pick Equius up all the time, and then you started getting fat and he stopped coming as much, and then he started coming more and you never showed up again until now, and that's because you're disgusted with how you look.”

Her mouth opened slightly, but she didn't even know where to start. This man, an employee of the gym, had just offended her in several ways, and she wanted to go off on him about that, but there had to be a reason as to why. Equius did some strange things, but they always had a valuable lesson or point attached; sticking her with this seemingly abusive trainer had to come with one of those lessons. It was just too bad that he wasn't there so she could ask him. “I think you've got some of that wrong, but I think you've got a basic idea. Except, don't just think I was sitting at home wasting my time away by ruining my body.”

“No, I know what was going on. Don't think that Equius didn't tell us all about it. I think his locker is still covered with baby pictures on the inside. He tapes them up even though I fucking tell him not to do that.” It took a second, but Sollux covered his mouth and apologized for his use of profanity. “Didn't mean to offend you there, AA. Wait, can I call you AA?”

“Yes, you certainly can call me that if you want, and I wasn't offended. Just because I'm married to a guy who thinks saying heck is bad doesn't mean that I think the same thing. In fact, I kind of like to curse every once in a while.” She then turned the conversation back to where it had been before the curse had been used. “He's got the pictures of Harrison in his locker?”

“Sure does. Cute kid, by the way. Looks a whole lot like his dad.”

She couldn't help but smile at the compliments. “He certainly does look like his dad. He's built like him, too. Which is most of the reason why I'm stuck looking like this.” That was when she gestured to her body, which was covered with a tank top and shorts that tightly hugged every curve she had. “The other reason isn't so great, so we'll just skip it.”

“You tricked mindfucked Equius into letting you eat junk instead of his crazy diet. Again, he's told all of us. There's not a lot about your personal life that he doesn't share with us while he's doing his exercises. Speaking of which, guess what time it is.” A smile that gave Aradia a great look at the man's braces graced his face, and she gulped. “Don't be scared. It's just a tiny workout. Remember whatever high school gym class you had to take? This'll be like that. So easy, an eighth grader can do it.”

There was just enough time for a sigh of relief to escape Aradia's lips before Sollux continued. “You'll be starting by running a few laps out on the track. By a few, I mean four.” The smile grew larger. “And don't worry, I won't be timing it and you'll have me running by your side. By the time you're the shape you want to be, you'll be able to run this faster than you've ever imagined. Now let's get out there and do some running.”

By the time the laps, which he later revealed equaled to an entire mile, were finished, it had been over a half hour and Aradia wanted to curl up and die. But Sollux was unrelenting, pushing her harder than she imagined he would have for the first workout. By the time he was done with her, she was in so much pain that she honestly would have rather been back in the middle of childbirth than where she was. It hurt to take steps, to lift her arms even an inch, and, most terribly, it hurt to sit down. That made for a very fun rest of her night, with Equius playfully teasing her about how she was feeling, and her needing to fulfill her duties as a mother still. Although she was working to erase the damage her son had done to her, there was no erasing the fact that he existed.

The worst part of it all was that, two nights later, she was back with Sollux doing it all over again.

* * *

After the first few weeks of working out, the pain wasn't nearly as noticeable afterward, but there were very few physical changes that anyone could notice by looking at her. “I feel bad making Sollux take all this time out of his life to help me when it's not really helping,” Aradia offhandedly said, looking at herself in the mirror with a frown on her face. “Maybe I should just start doing it myself, and let him be behind the counter where he wants to be.”

“That would be even less useful than what he's doing, because he knows how to make someone lose weight and see results. He's just slowly getting you prepared for it.” She heard Equius sigh from where he was laying, and she turned to look at him. He was width-wise on the bed, a thin sheet covering his body from being completely nude, and he had a sleeping Harrison curled on his chest. “One day soon, you'll look at yourself in that mirror and be amazed at what you see.”

Her frown turned to a small smile, and she joined her two boys on the bed, laying right next to Equius and placing a hand on her son's back. “I hope that day's soon. As much as I'm okay with who I am, I'm ready to be back to my small self again.”

“I'm ready for you to be small again as well. I may love you, but I much rather prefer the you who is small enough for me to carry without hurting myself.” He gave a soft chuckle, keeping himself quiet as to not wake the sleeping child. “Then again, why do I need to carry you anymore when I have someone else to carry?”

“What about when Harrison doesn't want to be carried? Won't you want to pick me up and cradle me like you used to?”

He stayed silent for a bit longer than Aradia would have liked him to—and the immediate feeling of something being wrong overtook her. What if he was thinking about saying no, that he didn't want to actually hold her anymore? What if there was someone else taking his attention, and they weren't in the bedroom right then? But her fears mostly subsided when he finally replied, “I've wanted to do that again for a long time. It was always nice to hold you so close to my heart.”

“You're never this sappy, Equius. It's kind of nice to hear you actually talking about romantic things.” She rolled onto her side so that she was facing him, and sighed. “Scratch that. It's very nice to hear this. You never fail to make me smile.”

She expected him to give another cheesy response, but what she got was an awkward laugh that was more concerning than any silence could ever be. “And now I'm going to make you frown again. My father's coming next week.”

“Way to ruin the happy mood here,” she jokingly said, not believing him, “but I know that's not true. You would have asked me if he could come first.”

“He invited himself.” She was going to reply with another joke but it set in that he was indeed being serious, and there was nothing she could do to stop this from happening. So she made a mental note to spend as much time as she could at the gym during his visit—but as if he could read her mind, Equius had something to say about that plan. “Don't try to run off and over-exercise while he's here. It'll end badly for everyone, you especially. Just suffer through the visit with me.”

“Okay, but I'm not going to like it, and you're going to have to make it up to me big time.”

As if that was the answer he had expected her to give, his eyes lit up a bit. “I already have made it up to you. There's a box in the guest room that's full of dresses I had Vriska make for you. Figured you might like having some new things to wear once you're back to your old size again.”

While she had started to smile at the sound of custom-made dresses, her face fell at the reminder that she was larger than she normally was, and therefore wouldn't fit in her new things. “That's so not fair, Equius!” she said, pushing him ever-so-slightly. The tiny movement was just enough to wake Harrison up, however, and she immediately felt guilty for it. “Oh, sorry...should I take him? Do you think it's feeding time?”

“No, no, I've got him. He'll quiet back down soon enough.” It only took a few strokes of a tanned hand across his back for him to fall asleep once more, letting both parents sigh in relief. “See, told you he'd quiet down.”

“I believed you. You're really great with him, you know, and I'm so happy that you're not only yourself all the time now, but that you've accepted him into your life even though you don't remember making him.” Talking about that fact made Aradia more upset than any jab at her weight could, because it just hurt knowing that she remembered that fateful night spent in the very bed they were laying on, while he didn't have a clue about it. “You're the best father ever.”

“Thank you for that, but I wouldn't be a great father if I didn't have someone who is a great mother right by my side.” He smiled, right before yawning. “I think it's about time for bed, so I think we should get him in his crib before we spoil him more by letting him sleep with us.”

She gave a quick and small giggle. “Sure thing, Equius. I'll put him in the crib, but then...” she debated with herself whether or not to say the rest of her statement, but she knew she had to, “I'm going to go downstairs and look at those dresses. I'll be back up later, though, I promise.”

“Do what you need to do, Aradia. I'll be here waiting for you.” She got up off the bed as quietly as she could, picked the sleeping child up off of his dad's chest, and placed him gently on the bottom of his crib, before kissing the top of his head lightly. He stirred just a bit when her hands pulled away, but he didn't cry and didn't fully wake up. That was when she turned around, saw that Equius had pulled the sheet off of himself and was just laying in his spot on the bed completely exposed to everything and making her want to join him instead of going to her box of dresses. “Oh, don't mind me,” he said, using his hands to cover himself. “You have something you're supposed to be doing.”

She nodded and left the room, glancing at herself in the mirror before she exited. Once she was downstairs and in the guest room, she could feel tears welling up in her eyes at the thought of the dresses not fitting her because she had become so ruined. That was exactly the kind of thing Vriska would do, though: make dresses knowing that the measurements for them were off and still expect them to be worn. And, once Aradia opened the box and actually saw the dresses in question, she figured that they were to be worn for some sort of special occasion, as all of them were frilly and absolutely gorgeous. “I can't believe this,” she said to herself, feeling the seemingly expensive fabric with her fingers. “Why would Vriska send me these? These aren't dresses that I'd be wearing around town...”

There was no sense in just looking at them, so she decided right there that she was going to try one on. It fit on her just enough that she could have it on but barely zipped up at all—but that was better than having it completely unzippable or, worse, unable to be put on. That in itself was a victory in her mind, but she knew that winning the war that was this fight with her body would be to actually be able to zip the dress up completely.

It was going to be a long battle, but whatever these dresses were for would make it worth it.

* * *

“You're not working hard enough,” Sollux shouted at Aradia with a bit of force to his voice, as she ran past him for what was her final lap of the night. “You're not taking things seriously and you're going to stay a fatass forever unless you actually fucking work!”

Hearing him sparked something inside her heart, but she was so drained from the workout he'd put her through that night to not even care about what he was saying. “Ignoring me now, huh? I don't get why you're even trying to make a difference in how you look, because you're not doing what I say and you're just wasting my time. Why don't you just stop, go back home, and return to being a housewife for a guy who could do so much better?” The verbal lashing continued for the whole rest of her lap, and when she was done, she expected more of the same. “Now that you're actually done, good job tonight. You're doing wonderful.”

She had to actually do a double take at the situation. Hadn't he just been harassing her moments before? “Thank you, Sollux,” she said, completely out of breath. “I'm happy to hear that.”

“Just between us, I didn't mean a damn word I said while you were running. It's called motivation. I figured you'd need some, and so I gave you some. Did it work?”

“It did work.” She couldn't help but try to smile at him, but she was simply to tired to move her facial muscles enough to do it. “Thanks for that. Give me enough of that and it'll be like Equius is out here watching me.”

“That doesn't sound very pleasant. That guy must be as much of an ass as I've always thought.” Sollux picked a water bottle up off the ground at his feet and handed it to Aradia, who took it and started drinking from it as fast as she could. “I mean, he's always so hard on everyone who can't do things right here, but I would have figured that he'd be nice to his wife.”

Once she had drank half the bottle of the cold water, she responded to him. “Well, he is nice to me, but in his own way. Right now he's being more harsh than normal because of his dad having been around the past few weeks.”

“Is that why you were here so much more than normal?”

She nodded, remembering all the extra time she had spent at the gym just to escape the verbal abuse that Aurthour liked to put her through. “Sure is. Equius hated it that I ditched him to be here, but he got over it when he realized that I was actually working out on my own, not just hiding from him.”

“I can tell you did some work on your own, actually.” Sollux's gaze shot straight to the ground after saying that, seemingly embarrassed for letting the words pass his lips. “I mean, is that weird? You're starting to carry yourself differently, more pride in your steps, and it's interesting to see the change.” He snorted. “But why do I care? You're not a single woman, I shouldn't be hitting on you.”

“If it makes you feel better, I didn't take that as being hit on. That was a compliment I've been wanting to hear from someone, and the guy responsible for training me is definitely allowed to comment on how I look different. Just don't let Equius hear you saying that about me. He might start getting ideas.” Aradia returned to drinking her water, as Sollux kicked at the ground and muttered things about how stupid it was for him to even be looking hard enough at her to notice what was probably a small change. He was interrupted by her throwing some of the water at him. “It isn't a small change. I've noticed it too, and I'm the biggest critic of my own damn body.”

He looked up at her, his face red with either anger or embarrassment. “Aradia, don't say that. You're just being positive. There's no fucking way you've lost nearly enough weight for me to notice it. You'll have caught it right away, but me? I didn't notice when my last girlfriend chopped off half her hair for two weeks. I won't have noticed that you're—“

“Smaller? Because I am.”

“—yes, I'm sure you are. But how should I know? I haven't asked you to weigh yourself for me, I haven't taken any measurements of your body, and I shouldn't be looking hard enough to see anything!”

“You don't have to look very hard, Sollux,” she said, pulling at her shirt a bit. “When I started this stupid working out thing, this shirt was way too tight. Hugged every single curve I had caused my body to have. And now, it's a lot looser, and, while it's still not exactly flattering, it's not sticking to me nearly as much. I'm sure you've noticed that.”

“You're also on that dumb diet that Equius insists on telling everyone about. Might just be the results of him not having let you eat yet today.”

She couldn't believe what she was hearing, but an ill-timed growl of her stomach made his point seem somewhat plausible, minus the fact that she had actually eaten only a few hours before. “He's not starving me. This is how I actually look now.”

“And me, some dumb nerd who works at the gym, has noticed it?” Sollux kicked the ground some more. “Come on, tell me I'm being stupid.”

“But you're not being stupid. What you've said is exactly right. You're not just some dumb nerd, you're my trainer. And you've done an amazing job. We just need to work together more to get me to where I want to be.” She thought to those dresses in the guest room, and how much she wanted to comfortably be wearing any one of them, and a small but present smile appeared on her lips. “I hope there will be a day that you can look at me and know you're looking at a big difference.”

Without warning, he grabbed her into a hug and squeezed her tightly, looking into her eyes with his differently-colored ones. “We'll get you to be whatever you want and more, and it'll be amazing. Hard work, but amazing.”

Aradia was too busy being happy and hugged to notice that Equius had come up behind them, but the moment she heard his heavy breathing, she pulled away from Sollux and tried to distance herself from both men. “I wasn't hugging him,” she tried to argue, but the truth was that she had gotten into the hug a lot more than she had expected to. “It was just him congratulating me for doing such a good job.”

“Sure was.” Those were the only two words Sollux said before disappearing back into the gym building, leaving the couple outside alone.

“Do I need to find you someone else to help you with your workouts? There's no shortage of worthy, non-wife stealing people who could fill that role.”

She violently shook her head. “No! Sollux is doing a great job and I want to keep working out with him, not someone new! He's become a friend to me, and you're not taking that from me.”

“No one said I was taking anything from you. I was just curious if you wanted him replaced, because he was making this less of a formal thing and more personal.” Equius took the opportunity to approach his wife and drape an arm over her shoulders, letting her squirm underneath it. “But if you're comfortable with having a friend boss you around, so be it.”

“I'm perfectly fine with him being my friend and being my trainer. Now if you were training me, I'd request to get someone new, but that's because I know what's coming will be difficult and if you were in Sollux's position, you'd go way too easy on me.” She knew that Equius hated her body the way it was, but she also knew that he wasn't able to be too dominating over her without getting distracted. That fact brought her to a completely unrelated point, but one that she figured she should say nonetheless: “Now, if you want to be rough, we should probably go get our son and then go home...”

“Are you implying things that I think you're implying?” Regardless of if she was or not, he began to sweat a lot more than he already was just thinking about the possibilities. “Oh, I like this idea. Let's go before you decide to change your mind and use this to tease me.” She laughed and they started to walk back into the building, the first step to getting to have some bedroom fun that night.

* * *

By the time the next spring rolled around, several things had happened that forever changed Aradia's life in different ways. The first, which had happened at the seasons' turn from summer to fall, was the news that one of her best friends, along with her family that consisted of cute children and a husband that Equius was close with, had decided that the city wasn't where they needed to live and chose to move away. Aradia didn't even offer to take Terezi and the girls out for ice cream like she had done so many times before, because she figured it would mess up all that she'd been working towards.

Then there was the planning and holding of a birthday party for Harrison just a few weeks after that—which almost didn't happen because of lack of friends in the area and the fact that both of the parents didn't want to have to miss their time at the gym for a party no one was going to attend. They realized soon enough that celebrating their son being with them for a year was much, much more important than anything else, and so they gathered enough people to make the day memorable.

Some time after New Year's, Aradia was looking through the dresses in the box, after Vriska had called her and specifically asked her if she could fit into them. She honestly hadn't known the answer, so she had to try them on and see. It was while touching the fabric and thinking about what the dresses would even be for that she realized just how wrong she'd been doing things. She'd let a friend slip away without so much as a final get-together. She'd almost let her son's birthday pass without any notice. On the topic of that little boy, she'd missed a lot of his big milestones because she'd been worrying too much about making herself smaller. There had been a day where she went to her mom's house and found Harrison crawling all over the place, then another day months later where he was taking shaky steps all on his own. And she hadn't been there for either of those moments.

What had happened to her? Ever since she had started working out, started trying to change who she had become, she had lost all focus on everything aside from the gym and what she did there. Sure, she was pretty sure she still had a somewhat strong relationship with Equius, but other than nights where they'd interact after a workout, they really didn't do much in the way of showing love towards each other. It was more like strangers living in a house together, much like it had been when Equius didn't remember who she was at all. Except, this time, they both fully knew who the other was, they just chose not to express any care.

Because of how that relationship was starting to deteriorate, she had become ever-so-closer with Sollux, going to him instead of Equius when she needed someone to talk to. It was wrong of her, but she trusted and liked her friend a lot more than her husband, and she didn't want to burden someone who probably didn't care when she had a friend who did. That was why, after she got one of the dresses on properly, the first person she told about it after Vriska was Sollux, not the man sleeping in the bedroom right above her head. He was so proud of her, having been the one to walk her through her journey to a smaller size, and he decided that he'd take it upon himself to treat her for her accomplishment.

When spring was on their doorstep, things had only gotten worse, and Aradia knew it. She wasn't obsessively working out anymore, so she was spending much more time at home with Harrison, who really had grown up in the year since she had started her weight loss adventure. He was always following her around, walking behind her with little heavy footsteps that echoed on hard floors, babbling to himself with almost-words that she wished she could understand. He reminded her so much of his father, who she never saw anymore other than in the mornings before he'd go to work or at night when he'd come home from his now-daily workouts.

Once a week she'd go over to the gym herself to spend time with Sollux, who was very happy to go running with her and help her do some exercising, before they'd just sit and talk about life and how things were going for them. He was always greeting her with a braced smile, one that was warm and kind and something she should have only been getting from the man who loved her. She appreciated his friendship, especially when her marriage was, in her mind, crumbling from around her. There wasn't any interaction between her and Equius when they were at the gym together, and if they made eye contact he would be quick to avert his stare elsewhere.

On the first day of spring itself, everything got to its absolute worst point, which started when Aradia got home from spending the afternoon with her mom and found Equius already at the house, an oddity considering that he was rarely home anymore. He didn't say a word to her, just handing her a stack of papers and walking up the stairs to what _used_ to be their bedroom, which was now solely his. Her heart skipped several beats when she felt the texture of paper in her hands, thinking only one thing: these were documents that were going to put the inevitable end to their relationship.

There was nothing she could say, standing there with the papers in hand, thinking about exactly where things went wrong. The only time she could pin down was when she had decided to change herself, and that bothered her. Hadn't he wanted her to become like she once was? What had happened to him being supportive of her changing?

A small hand grabbed onto her leg, and she looked down, seeing Harrison standing there with his deep blue eyes that looked just so much like his dad's. That was when the tears started falling, rolling down her cheeks like waterfalls, and she had to sit down and just cry about everything. What were they going to do about the little boy? He was both of theirs, and if they were splitting up...she didn't want to lose her son. Her crying over him was interrupted by thundering steps down the stairs, followed by a suitcase being tossed towards the door. “You're still in here?” Equius asked, his voice rough and tired. “I would have thought you'd be in your room, getting your stuff together.”

“I'm sorry that you want me out of your house right now, but it's not happening.” She wiped at her eyes with the hand that wasn't currently holding papers. “I'm going to be here a while. Way to just drop this on me.”

“What are you talking about? You knew this was coming.”

She shook her head, looking at him as a fresh round of tears started falling. “I didn't know! Yeah, things have been kind of rocky between us, but I wasn't expecting you to decide to divorce me!”

Equius laughed, but it wasn't the gruff laugh Aradia figured he'd give. It was as if he was laughing at something funny, and she didn't see anything funny about the situation at hand. “You haven't looked at what I handed you, have you?” When she said that she hadn't, but she knew what it was, he laughed again. “Obviously you have no clue what it is, if you're thinking those are divorce papers.”

“You mean they're not?” She was still crying, but she looked at the papers and immediately felt stupid for everything she had just thought. In her hand were paper copies of plane tickets, as well as reservations for a hotel room at a island resort. “What is this? I thought we were having problems!”

“We are having problems. I've been working extra hours to save up the money for this trip, and you've been thinking I'm trying to avoid you. Which, no, I haven't tried to avoid you at all. When you moved down to the guest room, I realized that you were either cheating on me or trying to give me my space because you thought I was mad.” He took the papers back from her to save them from getting wet, and smiled. “I haven't been mad at all. In fact, I've been a bit hurt that you haven't tried to be around me when I've been home. Sleeping alone is terrible.”

“Why didn't you say anything about this? Why didn't I know this was what was going on?”

“I tried to keep it secret the best I could, but I gave you a really big hint when you got that box of dresses. Why would I have Vriska send you fancy dresses without a reason for you to need them? And why would I insist on you getting in shape unless there was something you needed to look more gorgeous than normal for?” Things still weren't clicking in Aradia's mind, until Equius continued. “This has all been being planned for over a year now. Actually, since right after that whole 'end of the world' debacle.”

She thought for a moment, and then: “Those aren't just normal wearing dresses. They're dresses to wear to a wedding, aren't they?”

“They sure are. A wedding that we have to be leaving for in just a few hours.”

“But why wasn't I told about that? Why was I just given the dresses and expected to make my own conclusions from that?”

He shrugged. “That was the way Vriska wanted it. She might be a good dressmaker, but she's not good at planning weddings.”

“She really isn't...I was so worried that you were going to leave me and I didn't want that. I love you, Equius. I really do.” Aradia's tears were starting to dry on her cheeks, which made her big smile seem a lot more sad than it was. “And I'm so glad that you're not leaving me and that there's no huge issue here.”

“Well, there is a huge issue, that being that you've neglected everyone but yourself and Sollux lately. But he's been telling me everything you've told him, so this set-up was a bit of his idea. He figured that scaring you into thinking I didn't love you would make you realize how much I really do...and I guess it worked. When we get back, I'll have to tell him that.” He wasn't smiling anymore, but there was a bit of a dark blush on his face that showed how sincere he was being. “But, before I even do that, I think I'll have to spend some good, quality time with you. It's been a long while since we've done anything even remotely romantic, you know.”

“I do know, believe me.” She stood up and put her face next to his, kissing his reddened cheek gently. “I'll go start packing my things, since I didn't know I needed to do that before now. Which of those dresses do I bring?”

Once again, he shrugged. “I don't know. Honestly, I don't think Nepeta's even decided yet.”

“Wait, Nepeta? This is—oh! That means Dave and Terezi will be there and I didn't properly say goodbye to them! This is going to be so great!” She ran off to the guest room where she had stored all her things weeks before, to get ready to pack. As she was leaving, the little boy that had been sitting right next to her looked in her direction and calmly said a simple word.

Except, unlike all the milestones he had hit before, she was actually there to witness it, hearing him clearly say his very first word, a mispronunciation of the last word she herself had said, and she was there as he said it again: “g'ate”. Life had gone from terrible to amazing in a matter of minutes, and there was absolutely nothing that would ruin things for her right then. She was back to her old self, with her loving husband and adorable son, with her friends that she cared for and cared about her, and things were just amazing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here marks the end of the fic to this point. While I have more planned (as well as one short installment), nothing else has been written due to other projects that have taken higher priority. But if you like this and want more, please let me know! It might spark a change in schedule!


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